THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

DAVIS 


HOURS 


AND  BOOKS 


WILLIAM   MATHEWS,  LL.D. 


THIRTEENTH    EDITION. 


CHICAGO: 
0.  GRIGGS  AND   COMPANY. 

1895. 


LIBRARY 

UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
DAVIS 


COPT-RIGHT,  1877, 
Br  8.  C.  GRIGGS  AND  COMPANY. 


Kfjr  ILakrsitit 

R.    R.   DONNELLEY   &•   SONS   CO.,  CHICAGO 


TO 

HON.  HENRY  W.  PAINE,  LL.D. 

OF  BOSTON,  MASS., 


IN  MEMORY  OP  A  LIFE-LONG   FRIENDSHIP,  BEGUN  IN  MY  SCHOOL-BOY 
DAYS,   WHEN,   AS  MY  TEACHER, 


"tu  solebas 
Meas  esse  aliquid  putare  nugas," 


THIS  BOOK  IS  INSCKIBED 
WITH  THE  AFFECTIONATE  REGARDS  OP 

THE  AUTHOR. 


CONTENTS. 


I.  THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY,               -  -             -         9 

II.  ROBERT  SOUTH,     -  58 

III.  CHARLES  H.  SPURGEON,  *      81 

IV.  RECOLLECTIONS  OF  JUDGE  STORY,  97 
V.  MORAL  GRAHAMISM,    -  -  -     117 

VI.  STRENGTH  AND  HEALTH,   -  129 

VII.  PROFESSORSHIPS  OF  BOOKS  AND  READING,        -     136 

VIII.  THE  MORALITY  OF  GOOD  LIVING,  159 

IX.  THE  ILLUSIONS  OF  HISTORY,   -  -     171 

X.  HOMILIES  ON  EARLY  RISING,  229 

XI.  LITERARY  TRIFLERS,  -  -             -     237 

XII.  WRITING  FOR  THE  PRESS,  256 

XIII.  THE  STUDY  OF  THE  MODERN  LANGUAGES,       -     263 

XIV.  WORKING  BY  RULE,  272 
XV.  Too  MUCH  SPEAKING,  -     279 

XVI.  A  FORGOTTEN  WIT,  287 

XVII.  ARE  WE  ANGLO-SAXON?  -  299 

XVIII.  A  DAY  AT  OXFORD,  307 

XIX.  AN  HOUR  AT  CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL,  -  -  327 

XX.  BOOK-BUYING*  -  336 

XXI.  A  PINCH  OF  SNUFF,   -             -  -             -     347 


THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 


A  BOUT  twenty  years  ago  there  might  have  been  seen 
-*--*-  flitting  about  the  rural  lanes  in  the  neighborhood 
of  Edinburgh,  Scotland,  a  strange,  diminutive,  spectral- 
looking  being,  clad  in  a  motley  costume,  with  his  hat 
hung  over  the  back  of  his  head,  his  neck-cloth  twisted 
like  a  wisp  of  straw,  and  altogether  so  grotesque-looking, 
that  you  could  not  help  stopping  to  look  at  him,  and 
wondering  to  what  race,  order,  or  age  of  human  beings 
he  belonged.  As  you  stopped  to  look  at  him,  you  found 
him  also  stopping  in  suspicious  alarm,  and  looking  back 
at  you;  and  then  suddenly,  like  some  ticket-of-leave  man, 
hastily  moving  on,  and,  as  if  fearful  of  being  caught, 
darting  round  the  first  turning,  and  disappearing  from 
view.  What  was  your  surprise  when  it  was  whispered  in 
your  ear  that  in  this  fragile  and  unsubstantial  figure, — 
this  dagger  of  lath, —  this  ghostly  body  resting  on  a  pair 
of  immaterial  legs,  which  you  could  have  "  trussed  with 
all  its  apparel  into  an  eelskin" — resided  one  of  the  most 
potent  and  original  spirits  that  ever  dwelt  in  a  tenement 
of  clay!  And  how  was  your  surprise  deepened,  when 
you  were  further  told  that  this  singular  being, —  this 
migratory  and  almost  disembodied  intellect, —  this  little 
wandering  anatomy,  topped  with  a  brain,  whom  you  had 
found  so  shy,  as  if  he  had  "  feared  each  bush  an  officer," 
—  was  one  of  the  subtlest  thinkers,  and  the  greatest 


10  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

masters  of  English  prose,  in  this  century;  in  a  word,  the 
far-famed  "Opium-Eater,"  Thomas  DeQuincey!  It  is  the 
character  and  writings  of  this  extraordinary  man,  and 
most  unique  and  original  genius,  that  we  purpose  to  con 
sider  in  this  essay. 

Among  all  the  charmed  names  of  modern  English  lit 
erature,  is  there  probably  any  other  English  author  whose 
works  are  read  and  re-read  with  such  feelings  of  delight, 
wonder,  and  admiration  as  those  of  DeQuincey?  Glanc 
ing  over  the  books  that  are  books  on  his  shelves,  \each 
the  precious  life-blood  of  a  master-spirit,  "  the  purest 
efficacy  and  extraction  of  that  living  spirit  that  bred 
them,"  does  the  scholar's  eye  rest  on  any  with  which  it 
would  cost  him  a  keener  pang  to  part,  than  with  the 
writings  of  this  great  magister-sententiarum, —  this  Aqui- 
nas-Richter, —  this  arch-dreamer  of  dreams,  "the  Opium- 
Eater?"  Read  wherever  the  English  language  is  spoken, 
he  is  by  universal  acknowledgment  the  most  powerful 
and  versatile  master  of  that  tongue  in  our  time, —  the 
acutest,  and  at  the  same  time  the  most  gorgeous  and  elo 
quent  writer  of  English  prose  in  the  nineteenth  century. 
Where,  in  the  entire  range  of  our  later  literature,  will 
you  find  an  intellect  at  once  so  solid  and  so  subtle,  so 
enormous  learning  conjoined  with  such  power  of  original 
thinking,  so  daring,  eccentric  wit  and  grotesque  fun  with 
such  sharpness  and  severity  of  style?  Whatever  the  sub 
ject  he  discusses,  whether  the  character  of  the  Caesars  or 
the  Aristocracy  of  England,—  Homer  and  the  Hoineridae,  or 
Nichols's  System  of  the  Heavens, —  Lessing's  Laocoon,  or 
the  English  Corn-Laws, — War,  or  Murder  considered  as  one 
of  the  Fine  Arts,— Casuistry,  or  Dinner,  Real  and  Reputed, 
-  Miracles,  or  Secret  Societies, —  Logic,  Political  Economy, 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCE Y.  11 

or  the  Sphinx's  Riddle, —  he  treats  all  in  the  same  fasci 
nating,  yet  subtle  and  searching  manner,  investing  them 
with  the  charms  of  learning  and  scholarship,  wit  and 
humor,  and  combining,  as  have  rarely  before  been  com 
bined,  the  rarely  harmonizing  elements  of  severe  logic 
and  exuberant  fancy. 

Who,  that  has  once  read  it,  will  ever  forget  that 
wondrous  paper  on  "The  English  Mail  Coach?"  —  that 
coach  on  which  he  rode,  and  on  which  it  was  "  worth 
five  years  of  life  to  ride,"  after  the  battle  of  Talavera, — 
rode  as  if  borne  on  the  wings  of  a  mighty  victory  flying 
by  night  through  the  sleeping  land,  "  that  should  start  to 
its  feet  at  the  words  they  came  to  speak?"  What  mar 
vellous  word-painting  in  the  sketch  entitled  "  The  Spanish 
Nun,"  and  in  the  essay  on  "  Modern  Superstitions," — 
particularly  in  the  descriptions  of  the  phantoms  which 
haunt  the  traveler  in  trackless  deserts,  and  of  the  strange 
voices  which  are  heard  by  those  who  sail  upon  unknown 
seas!  What  lover  of  the  horrible  will  ever  forget  the 
weird,  snake-like  fascination  of  that  masterpiece  of  pow 
erful  writing  in  which  De  Quincey's  slow,  sustained,  long- 
continued  method  of  following  a  subject  reaches  a  climax 
in  his  art  of  dealing  with  the  feeling  of  terror, —  we  mean 
the  "Three  Memorable  Murders?"  Anything  more  fear 
fully  thrilling  than  the  description  of  Williams,  the  mur 
derer,  with  his  ghastly  face,  in  whose  veins  ran,  not 
life-blood,  that  could  kindle  into  a  blush  of  shame,  but 
a  sort  of  green  sap, —  with  his  eyes  that  seemed  frozen 
and  glazed,  as  if  their  light  were  all  converged  upon 
some  victim  lurking  in  the  background,  and  the  oiliness 
and  snaky  insinuation  of  his  demeanor,  that  counteracted 
the  repulsiveness  of  his  physiognomy, —  who,  if  you  hnd 


12  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

run  against  him  in  the  street,  would  have  offered  the 
most  gentlemanly  apologies,  hoping  that  the  mallet  under 
his  coat,  his  hidden  instrument  of  murder,  had  not  hurt 
you!  — anything  more  horrible  than  this  never  froze  the 
blood,  or  held  the  spirit  petrified  in  terror's  hell  of  cold. 
Compared  with  the  spell  worked  by  this  mighty  magician, 
the  necromancy  of  Monk  Lewis  is  tame;  the  stories  with 
which  Ann  Radcliffe,  Miss  Crowe,  Schiller,  and  even  the 
Baron  Reichenbach  himself,  make  the  blood  run  cold,  the 
nerves  prick,  and  the  hair  stand  on  end,  are  dull  and 
insipid;  and  the  enchantments  of  all  the  other  high-priests 
of  the  supernatural,  cheap  and  vulgar.  - 

Again,  with  what  a  magnetism  does  De  Quincey  hold  us 
in  the  "  Retreat  of  a  Tartar  Tribe,"  a  paper  recording 
a  section  of  romantic  story  *'  not  equalled,"  he  says, 
"since  the  retreat  of  the  fallen  angels!"  What  a 
fluctus  decumanus  of  rhetoric  is  his  "  Vision  of  a  Sudden 
Death," — a  tale  as  mystically  fearful  as  "The  Ancient 
Mariner."  With  what  a  climax  of  painful  incident,  begin 
ning  with  an  absolute  minimum  of  interest,  does  he  chain 
our  attention  in  "  The  Household  Wreck ! "  How  he  thrills 
us  with  the  fiery  eloquence  of  the  Confessions,  and  entrances 
us  with  the  solemn,  sustained,  and  lyrical  raptures  of  the 
"Suspiria,"  and  the  "Dream  Fugue1'  following  his  "Vision 
of  a  Sudden  Death ! "  What  a  power  he  exhibits  of  seizing 
the  impalpable  and  air-drawn  scenery  of  dreams,  and 
embodying  it  in  impassioned  language, —  a  faculty  which 
nowhere  else,  in  the  whole  compass  of  literature,  has  been 
so  vividly  displayed,  as  in  that  piece,  so  daring  in  its 
imaginative  sweep,  the  final  climax  of  his  "Joan  of  Arc!'1 
Dip  wherever  we  will  into  this  author's  writings,  we  find 
on  every  page  examples  of  the  same  narrative  power,  the 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  13 

same  depth  and  keenness  of  philosophic  criticism,  the  same 
psychological  subtlety  detecting  the  most  veiled  aspects  of 
things,  the  same  "  quips,  and  cranks,  and  wanton  wiles  " 
of  fancy,  relieving  the  severity  of  the  profoundest  thoughts, 
the  same  dazzling  fence  of  rhetoric,  the  same  imperial 
dominion  over  the  resources  of  expression,  and  the  same 
sustained,  witching  melody  of  style.  In  his  curious  brain 
the  most  opposite  elements  are  united;  "fire  and  frost 
embrace  each  other." 

At  once  colossal  and  keen,  DeQuincey's  intellect  seems 
capable  of  taking  the  profoundest  views  of  men  and  things, 
and  of  darting  the  most  piercing  glances  into  details ;  it  has 
an  eagle's  eye  to  gaze  at  the  sun,  and  the  eye  of  a  cat  to 
glance  at  things  in  the  dark ;  is  quick  as  a  hawk  to  pounce 
upon  a  brilliant  falsehood,  yet  as  slow  as  a  ferret  to  pursue 
a  sophism  through  all  its  mazes  and  sinuosities.  Now 
meditative  in  gentle  thought,  and  anon  sharp  in  analytic 
criticism ;  now  explaining  the  subtle  charm  of  Wordsworth's 
poetry,  and  again  unravelling  a  knotty  point  in  Aristotle, 
or  cornering  a  lie  in  Josephus ;  to-day  penetrating  the  bowels 
of  the  earth  with  the  geologist,  to-morrow  soaring  through 
the  stellar  spaces  with  the  astronomer;  it  seems  exactly 
fitted  for  every  subject  it  discusses,  and  reminds  you  of  the 
elephant's  lithe  proboscis,  which  with  equal  dexterity  can 
uproot  an  oak  or  pick  up  a  pin.  Of  this  universality  of  his 
genius  one  who  knew  him  well  says,  that  in  theology  his 
knowledge  was  equal  to  that  of  two  bishops ;  in  metaphysics 
he  could  puzzle  any  German  professor;  in  astronomy  he 
outshone  Professor  Nichol;  in  chemistry  he  could  outdive 
Samuel  Brown;  and  in  Greek,  excite  to  jealousy  the  shades 
of  Porson  and  Samuel  Parr.  In  short,  to  borrow  an  illus 
tration  of  Macaulay,  it  is  hardly  an  exaggeration  to  say  of 


14  THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY. 

the  Opium-Eater's  intellect,  that  it  resembled  the  tent 
which  the  fairy  Paribanou  gave  to  Prince  Ahmed, — "  Fold 
it,  and  it  seemed  a  toy  for  the  hand  of  a  lady;  spread  it, 
and  the  armies  of  powerful  sultans  might  repose  beneath 
its  shade." 

Witty  all  this  capaciousness  and  subtlety,  however, 
DeQuincey 's  is,  at  the  same  time,  of  all  intellects  the  most 
vagrant  and  capricious, —  scorning  above  all  things  the 
beaten  track,  doing  nothing  by  square,  rule,  and  compass, 
and  never  pursuing  any  path  of  inquiry,  without  digres 
sion,  for  ten  minutes  together.  Whatever  the. subject  he 
announces  to  be  under  discussion,  the  title  of  one  of  his 
papers  affords  you  no  key  to  its  contents.  Like  Montaigne, 
who  in  his  chapter  on  Coaches  treats  only  of  Alexander  and 
Julius  Caesar,  or  like  the  writer  on  Iceland,  who  begins  his 
chapter,  "  Of  the  Snakes  of  Iceland,"  by  saying  "  There 
are  no  snakes  in  Iceland,1' — DeQuincey  contents  himself 
often  with  the  barest  allusion  to  his  theme,  and  strays  into 
a  thousand  tempting  bye-paths,  leading  off  whole  leagues 
therefrom, — "  winding  like  a  river  at  its  own  sweet  will," — 
shedding  "  a  light  as  from  a  painted  window "  on  the  most 
trivial  objects, —  but  profoundly  indifferent  whether,  at  the 
end  of  his  disquisition,  he  will  have  made  any  progress 
toward  the  goal  for  which  he  started.  Like  a  fisherman,  he 
throws  out  his  capacious  net  into  the  ocean  of  learning,  and 
sweeps  in  everything,  however  miscellaneous  or  motley  its 
character.  Hence,  in  reading  his  logical  papers,  you 
declare  him  the  prince  of  desperate  jokers;  reading  his 
jeux  d'esprit,  you  are  ready  with  Archdeacon  Hare  to  pro 
nounce  him  the  great  logician  of  our  times.  "Oh,  Mr. 
North!  Mr.  North! "  shouts  the  Ettrick  Shepherd  in  one  of 
<&e  "Noctes."  when  DeQuincey  is  about  to  refute  one  of  his 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  15 

post-prandial  propositions,  "  I'm  about  to  fa'  into  Mr. 
De  Quinshy's  hauns,  sae  come  to  my  assistance,  for  I  canna 
thole,  being  pressed  up  backward,  step  by  step,  intell  a 
corner,  till  an  argument  that's  ca'd  a  clincher  clashes  in 
your  face,  and  knocks  your  head  in  sic  force  against  the 
wa',  that  your  crown  gets  a  clour,  leaving  a  dent  in  the 
wainscot." 

Fully  to  estimate  an  author,  we  must  know  the  man; 
and  therefore,  before  entering  upon  a  more  critical  notice 
of  the  Opium-Eater's  genius,  let  us  glance  at  some  of  the 
more  notable  facts  of  his  life  and  character.  Thomas 
De  Quincey  was  born  at  Greenhayes,  near  Manchester,  in 
1785.  His  father,  a  foreign  merchant,  who  began  life 
with  what  has  been  termed  "  the  dangerous  fortune  of 
£6,000,"  prospered  so  well  in  business  that,  when  he  died 
of  consumption  in  his  thirty-ninth  year,  he  left  to  his 
widow  and  six  young  children  a  fortune  of  £30,000  and 
a  pleasant  seat  in  the  place  just  named.  This  "  imperfectly 
despicable  man,"  as  De  Quincey  calls  him  in  allusion  to  his 
commercial  position,  rarely  saw  his  children;  and  it  was, 
therefore,  the  more  fortunate  that  they  had  so  good  a 
mother,  a  well-educated,  pious  woman,  who  spared  no  pains 
to  promote  their  welfare  and  happiness.  Thomas,  the  son, 
came  into  the  world,  as  he  tells  us,  upon  that  tier  of  the 
social  scaffolding  which  is  the  happiest  for  all  good  influ 
ences.  Agur's  prayer  was  realized  for  him;  he  was  neither 
too  high,  nor  too  low, —  too  rich,  nor  too  poor.  High 
enough  he  was  to  see  models  of  good  manners,  of  self- 
respect,  and  of  simple  dignity ;  obscure  enough  to  be  left  in 
the  sweetest  of  solitudes. 

He  was  a  singularly  small  and  delicate  child, —  with  a 
large   brain,  and   a   most  acute  rervou's   system,  ill  clad 


16  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

with  flesh, —  which  made  him  the  victim  of  those  ills  and 
miseries  of  boyhood  from  which  the  poet  Cowper,  in  his 
early  years,  so  keenly  suffered.  In  his  infancy  he  was 
afflicted  for  more  than  two  years  with  ague;  an  affliction 
which  was  compensated  by  the  double  share  of  affection 
lavished  upon  him  by  his  mother  and  sisters,  by  whom 
he  was  made  the  pet  of  the  family,  and  regarded  as  one 
of  the  sanctities  of  home.  When,  in  after  years,  like 
Marcus  Aurelius,  he  thanked  Providence  for  the  separate 
blessings  of  his  childhood,  he  was  wont  to  single  out  as 
worthy  of  special  commemoration,  that  "  he  lived  in  a 
rustic  solitude;  that  this  solitude  was  in  England;  that 
his  infant  feelings  were  moulded  by  the  gentlest  of  sisters, 
and  not  by  horrid  pugilistic  brothers;  and,  finally,  that 
he  and  they  were  dutiful  and  loving  members  of  a  pure, 
holy  and  magnificent  church." 

A  life  so  encompassed  and  hallowed  seems  specially 
adapted  to  develop  his  remarkable  mental  idiosyncrasies, 
and  to  intensify  his  exquisite  sensibilities;  but  he  was 
speedily  to  learn  that  there  is  no  earthly  seclusion 
inviolable  to  the  inroad  of  sorrow;  and  suddenly,  the 
whole  complexion  of  the  world  was  changed  for  him  by 
an  affliction  that  remained  apparently  an  abiding  grief 
through  life,  the  death  of  his  "gentlest  of  sisters," 
Elizabeth,  the  superb  development  of  whose  head  was 
the  astonishment  of  science.  The  marvelous  passage  in 
which  he  tells  us  how  he  bewailed  the  loss  of  this  sister, 
and  describes  his  feelings  when  he  stole  silently  and 
secretly  up  to  the  chamber  where  the  body  lay,  and, 
softly  entering  the  room,  closed  the  door,  and  found 
himself  alone  with  the  dead,— when,  catching  a  glimpse 
from  the  open  window  of  the  scenery  outside,  he  con- 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  17 

traslod  the  glory  and  the  pomp  of  nature,  redolent  of 
life  and  beauty,  with  the  little  body,  from  which  all  life 
had  tied,  lying  so  still  upon  its  bed, — "  the  frozen  eyelids, 
the  darkness  that  seemed  to  steal  from  beneath  them, 
the  marble  lips,  the  stiffening  hands  laid  palm  to  palm, 
as  if  repeating  the  supplications  of  closing  anguish," — 
is  one  of  the  most  beautiful  pieces  of  prose  in  our 
language. 

"Could  these  be  mistaken  for  life?  Had  it  been  so,  wherefore  did  I  not 
spring  to  those  lips  with  tears  and  never-ending  kisses?  But  so  it  was  not. 
I  stood  checked  for  a  moment;  awe,  not  fear,  fell  upon  me;  and  whilst  I 
stood,  a  solemn  wind  began  to  blow  —  the  saddest  that  ear  ever  heard.  It 
was  a  wind  that  might  have  swept  the  fields  of  mortality  for  a  thousand 
centuries.  Many  times  since  upon  summer  days,  when  the  sun  is  about  the 
hottest,  I  have  rema/ked  the  same  wind  arising  and  uttering  the  same 
hollow,  solemn,  Memuouian,  but  saintly  swell:  it  is  in  this  world  the  one 
great  audible  symbol  of  eternity.  And  three  times  in  my  life  have  I  hap 
pened  to  hear  the  same  sound  in  the  same  circumstances, —  namely,  when 
standing  between  an  open  window  and  a  dead  body  on  a  summer  day." 

In  the  same  connection,  he  says: 

"  God  speaks  to  children  also  in  dreams,  and  by  the  oracles  that  lurk 
in  darkness.  But  in  solitude,  above  all  things,  when  made  vocal  to  the 
meditative  heart  by  the  truths  and  services  of  a  national  church,  God  holds 
with  children  '  communion  undisturbed.'  Solitude,  though  it  may  be  silent 
as  light,  is,  like  light,  the  mightiest  of  agencies;  for  solitude  is  essential  to 
man.  All  men  come  into  this  world  alone;  all  leave  it  alone.  Even  a  little 
child  has  a  dread,  whispering  consciousness,  that,  if  he  should  be  summoned 
to  travel  into  God's  presence,  no  gentle  nurse  will  be  allowed  to  kad  him 
by  the  hand,  nor  mother  to  carry  him  in  her  arms,  nor  little  sister  to  share 
his  trepidations.  King  and  priest,  warrior  and  maiden,  philosopher  and 
child,  all  must  walk  those  mighty  galleries  alone.  The  solitude,  therefore, 
which  in  this  world  appals  or  fascinates  a  child's  heart,  is  but  the  echo  of  a 
far  deeper  solitude,  through  which  already  he  has  passed,  and  of  another 
solitude,  deeper  still,  through  which  he  has  to  pass:  reflex  of  one  solitude  — 
prefiguration  of  another." 

DeQuincey's  grief,  too  deep  for  tears,  would  perhaps 
have  hurried  him  into  an  untimely  grave,  had  he  not  been 
awakened,  somewhat  rudely,  from  his  reveries,  by  the 


18  THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY. 

arrival  home  of  his  elder  brother.  This  brother  was  an 
extraordinary  boy,  as  eccentric  in  his  way  as  Thomas  him 
self,  over  whom  he  tyrannized  by  the  mere  force  of  character. 
He  had  a  genius  for  mischief  amounting  almost  to  inspira 
tion;  "it  was  a  divine  afflatus  which  drove  him  in  that 
direction;  and  such  was  his  capacity  for  riding  in  whirl 
winds  and  directing  storms,  that  he  made  it  his  trade  to 
create  them,  in  order  that  he  might  direct  them."  A  strong 
contrast  was  this  active,  mischief-loving,  bold,  and  clever 
boy  to  the  puny  Thomas,  whom,  naturally  enough,  he 
thoroughly  despised.  His  martial  nature  prompted  him  to 
deeds  too  daring  for  the  meek  and  gentle  nature  of  the 
younger,  from  whom,  nevertheless,  he  exacted  the  most 
unquestioning  obedience.  This  obedience  was  based  on  the 
assumption  that  he  himself  was  commander-inLchief ;  there 
fore  Thomas  owed  him  military  allegiance, — while,  as  cadet 
of  his  house,  he  owed  him  suit  and  service  as  its  head. 

Having  declared  war  against  the  "hands"  of  a  Man 
chester  cotton  mill, —  one  of  whose  number  had  insulted 
them  by  calling  them  "  bucks,"  as  they  passed  along  Oxford 
Road  home  from  school,  the  elder  brother  made  the  younger 
major-general;  sometimes  directing  his  movements  upon 
the  flank,  and  sometimes  upon  the  rear  of  the  enemy, —  now 
planting  him  in  ambush,  and  now  as  a  corps  of  observation, 
as  the  exigencies  of  the  case  required.  For  two  entire 
years,  and  twice  every  day  in  the  week,  did  fearful  battle 
rage  between  the  belligerents  with  showers  of  stones  and 
sticks,  during  which  Thomas  was  thrice  a  prisoner  in  the 
enemy's  hands.  Arrived  at  home,  the  commander  issued  a 
bulletin  of  the  engagement,  which  was  read  with  much 
ceremony  to  the  housekeeper.  Sometimes  this  document 
announced  a  victory,  sometimes  a  defeat;  but  the  conduct 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  19 

of  the  major-general  was  sure  to  be  sharply  criticised, 
whatever  the  result.  Now  he  was  decorated  with  the  Bath, 
and  now  he  was  deprived  of  his  commission.  At  one  time 
his  services  merited  the  highest  promotion, —  at  another,  he 
behaved  with  a  cowardice  that  was  inexplicable,  except  on 
the  supposition  of  treachery.  Once  he  was  drummed  out 
of  the  army,  but  "  restored  at  the  intercession  of  a  distin 
guished  lady,'1 — to  wit,  the  housekeeper. 

A  most  wonderful  boy  was  this  brother,  who  absolutely 
hated  all  books,  except  those  which  he  himself  wrote ;  which 
were  not  only  numerous,  but  upon  every  subject  under  the 
sun;  so  that,  if  not  luminous,  he  could  boast  of  being  the 
most  vo-luminous  author  of  his  time.  He  kept  the  nursery 
in  a  perfect  whirl  of  excitement,  giving  burlesque  lectures 
"  on  all  subjects  known  to  man,  from  the  Thirty-nine 
Articles  of  our  English  church  down  to  pyrotechnics,  leger 
demain,  magic, —  both  black  and  white, —  thaumaturgy  and 
necromancy."  His  most  popular  treatise  was  entitled 
"  How  to  Raise  a  Ghost;  and  when  you've  got  him,  how  to 
keep  him  down."  He  also  gave  lectures  on  physics  to  an 
audience  in  the  nursery,  and  tried  to  construct  an  apparatus 
for  walking  across  the  ceiling  like  a  fly,  first  on  the  princi 
ple  of  skates,  and  afterward  upon  that  of  a  humming-top. 
He  was  profound  on  the  subject  of  necromancy,  and 
frequently  terrified  his  young  admirers  by  speculating  on 
the  possibility  of  a  general  confederation,  or  solemn  league 
and  conspiracy,  of  the  ghosts  of  all  time  against  the  single 
generation  of  men  at  any  one  time  composing  the  garrison 
of  this  earth.  He  made  a  balloon;  and  wrote,  and,  with 
his  brothers  and  sisters,  performed  two  acts  of  a  most  har 
rowing  tragedy,  in  which  all  the  personages  were  beheaded 
at  the  end  of  each  act,  leaving  none  to  carry  on  the  play,  a 


20  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

perplexity  which  ultimately  caused  "  Sultan  Amurath "  to 
be  abandoned  to  the  housemaids.  "It  is  well,"  observes 
De  Quincey,  "  that  my  brother's  path  in  life  diverged  from 
mine,  else  I  should  infallibly  have  broken  my  neck  in  con 
fronting  perils  which  brought  neither  honor  nor  profit." 

Thomas  De  Quincey  was  scarcely  ten  years  old  when  he 
began  laying  the  deep  foundations  of  that  wonderful  accu 
racy  which  he  acquired  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  tongues, 
and  storing  the  cells  of  his  memory  with  wide  and  varied 
information  by  browsing  freely  in  all  the  fields  of  litera 
ture.  After  receiving  instruction  from  a  succession  of 
masters,  at  Bath,  at  Winkfield,  and  at  Manchester,  he  began 
to  feel  that  profound  contempt  for  his  tutor  which  a  boy 
of  genius  always  feels  for  a  pompous  pedant;  and,  indig 
nant  because  his  guardians  did  not  allow  him  at  once  to 
enter  himself  at  the  University  of  Oxford,  he  ran  away  at 
night, —  with  a  small  English  poet  in  one  pocket,  and  nine 
plays  of  Euripides  in  the  other, —  and  began  wandering 
about  in  Wales.  Of  the  ups  and  downs  of  his  life  there, 
he  has  given  a  characteristically  vivid  account.  Sometimes 
he  slept  in  fine  hotels,  sometimes  on  the  hillside,  with 
nothing  but  the  heavens  to  shelter  him,  fearing  lest  "  while 
my  sleeping  face  was  upturned  to  the  stars,  some  one  of  the 
many  little  Brahminical-looking  cows  on  the  Cambrian 
hills,  one  or  other,  might  poach  her  foot  into  the  centre  of 
my  face;"  sometimes  he  dined  for  the  small  sum  of  six 
pence;  sometimes  he  wanted  a  dinner,  and  was  compelled 
to  relieve  the  cravings  of  his  hunger  by  plucking  and 
eating  the  berries  from  off  the  hedges;  and  sometimes  he 
earned  a  meal  and  a  night's  lodging  by  writing  letters  for 
cottagers  and  for  sweethearts. 

Weary   of    these   aimless   wanderings,   he    turned    his 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  21 

back  on  Wales,  and  next  found  himself  penniless  and 
without  a  friend,  in  the  solitude  of  London.  And  now 
began  that  painful,  yet  marvellous  and  intense]y  inter 
esting  episode  in  his  history,  which  he  has  so  vividly 
portrayed  in  the  "Confessions."  Now  began  that  wear 
ing  life,  which  chills  the  spirits,  saps  the  morality,  and 
turns  the  blood  to  gall, —  waiting  day  after  day  at  a 
usurer's  office,  perpetually  listening  to  fresh  excuses  for 
delay,  and  fresh  demands  for  the  preparation  of  fresh 
securities.  Strangest  and  most  thrilling  of  written  experi 
ence, —  where,  in  any  autobiography,  at  least,  shall  we 
find  its  equal?  Why,  instead  of  letting  these  vultures 
keep  him  in  suspense  till  he  was  on  the  verge  of  starva 
tion,  he  did  not  try  to  earn  a  living  by  his  pen,  or  by 
teaching,  is  a  mystery.  Not  only  would  he  receive  as 
heir,  in  four  years  more, —  for  he  was  now  seventeen, 
—  £4,000  or  £5,000,  an  almost  fabulous  sum  for  a  literary 
man  of  that  period,  but  he  had  abundant  resources 
against  want  in  his  teeming  imagination  and  elegant 
scholarship.  So  great  and  accurate  were  his  classical 
attainments,  that  his  master,  more  than  a  year  before, 
had  proudly  pointed  him  out  to  a  stranger,  with  the 
remark:  "That  boy  could  harangue  an  Athenian  mob 
better  than  you  or  I  could  address  an  English  one." 
Moreover,  we*  find  him,  soon  after  this,  gravely  weighing 
the  propriety  of  writing  a  remonstrance  in  Greek  to  the 
Bishop  of  Bangor,  concerning  some  fancied  insult  received 
at  the  hands  of  that  learned  prelate.  De  Quincey  himself 
tells  us  that  he  wielded  the  Greek  language  "  with  preter 
natural  address  for  varying  the  forms  of  expression,  and 
for  bringing  the  most  refractory  ideas  within  the  harness 
of  Grecian  phraseology." 


22  THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 

Of  this  accomplishment  he  was  never  inclined  to 
vaunt;  for  any  slight  vanity  which  he  might  connect 
with  a  power  so  rarely  attained,  and  which,  under  ordi 
nary  circumstances,  so  readily  transmutes  itself  into 
disproportionate  admiration  of  the  author,  in  him,  he 
tells  us,  was  absolutely  swallowed  up  in  the  tremendous 
hold  taken  of  his  entire  sensibilities  at  that  time  by  our 
English  literature.  Already  at  fifteen  he  had  made 
himself  familiar  with  the  great  English  poets,  and  had 
appreciated  the  subtle  charm  of  Wordsworth's  poetry, 
when  not  fifty  persons  in  England,  who  had  read  the 
sneering  criticisms  of  the  Edinburgh  Review,  knew  who 
the  poet  that  had  cautioned  men  against  "  growing 
double,"  was.  Here  we  cannot  help  quoting  from  his 
"Brief  Appraisal  of  the  Greek  Literature,"  a  noble 
passage  in  which,  in  spite  of  his  admiration  of  the 
Hellenic  genius,  he  confesses  the  superiority  of  the 
English:  "It  is,"  he  says,  "a  pitiable  spectacle  to  any 
man  of  sense  and  feeling,  who  happens  to  be  really 
familiar  with  the  golden  treasures  of  his  own  ancestral 
literature,  and  a  spectacle  which  alternately  moves  scorn 
and  sorrow,  to  see  young  people  squandering  their  time 
and  painful  study  upon  writers  not  fit  to  unloose  the 
shoes'  latchets  of  many  amongst  their  own  compatriots; 
making  painful  and  remote  voyages  aft&r  the  drossy 
refuse,  when  the  pure  gold  lies  neglected  at  their  feet." 
To  return  to  the  narrative:  —  unlike  Savage's  or  Chat- 
terton's,  De  Quincey's  misery  at  this  time  seems  to  have 
been  self-inflicted.  What  reader  of  the  "Confessions" 
has  forgotten  his  description  of  this  period,  when,  friend 
less  and  alone,  he  paced  up  and  down  the  never-ending 
streets  of  London,  with  their  pomp  and  majesty  of  life, 


THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY.  23 

a  prey  to  the  gnawings  of  hunger,  and  seeking  by 
constant  motion  to  baffle  the  piercing  cold?  What 
American  that  has  paced  those  silent  thoroughfares  after 
midnight,  has  not  thought  of  the  boy  who  wandered  up 
and  down  Oxford  street,  looking  at  the  long  vistas  of  the 
lamps,  and  conversing  with  the  unfortunate  creatures 
who  still  moved  over  the  cold,  hard  stones?  Who  does 
not  remember  how,  overpowered  by  the  pangs  of  inan 
ition,  he  fainted  away  in  Soho  Square,  and  was  rescued 
from  the  very  gates  of  death  by  a  poor  girl,  who  admin 
istered  to  him  a  tumbler  of  spiced  wine,  bought  with 
money  which  destitution  had  compelled  her  to  earn  by 
sin?  Whose  heart  has  not  been  touched  by  the  story 
of  "Poor  Anne"?  Her  wrongs  and  sorrows,  it  has  been 
well  said,  have  doubtless  caused  many  prayers  to  be 
breathed  for  others  who,  like  herself,  have  been  the 
victims  of  man's  dishonor  and  sin. 

For  more  than  sixteen  weeks  De  Quincey  was  a  prey 
to  hunger,  the  bitterest  that  a  man  can  suffer  and  sur 
vive.  During  all  this  time  he  slept  in  the  open  air,  and 
subsisted  on  a  precarious  charity.  At  last  he  found  an 
asylum,  better  at  least  than  a  stone  door-step  for  a 
night's  lodging, —  a  large,  empty  house,  peopled  chiefly 
with  rats.  There  at  night  he  would  lie  down  on  the  bare 
floor,  with  a  dusty  bundle  of  law-papers  for  a  pillow, 
and  a  cloak  and  an  old  sofa-covering  for  bed-clothes; 
while,  for  a  companion,  he  had  a  poor,  friendless  girl, — 
a  deserted  child,  about  ten  years  old, —  who  nestled  close 
to  him  for  warmth  and  protection  against  the  ghosts 
which,  to  her  infant  imagination,  peopled  the  hours  of 
darkness.  But  it  was  to  "  poor  Anne "  that  he  looked 
for  the  chief  solace  of  his  miserable  life.  He  never  knew 


24  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

her  surname,  and,  as  he  always  depended  upon  finding 
her,  he  did  not  think  it  necessary  to  learn  more.  Part 
ing  from  her  one  day  with  a  kiss  of  brotherly  affection, 
he  set  out  on  a  business  errand  to  Eton;  but  when  he 
returned  to  London,  he  lost  all  trace  of  her.  Night  after 
night  he  returned  to  the  trysting-place,  and  years  after 
in  visits  to  the  city  he  peered  into  myriads  of  faces  with 
the  hope  of  descrying  the  well-known  features;  but  in 
vain;  poor  Ann  he  never  saw  more.  Again  and  again 
would  he  pace  the  flags  of  Oxford  street,  the  "  stony 
hearted  step-mother,"  and  listen  again  to  the  tunes  which 
used  to  solace  himself  and  her  in  their  dreary  wander 
ings,  and  with  tears  would  exclaim:  "How  often  have  I 
wished  that,  as  in  ancient  times,  the  curse  of  a  father 
was  believed  to  have  a  supernatural  power,  and  pursue  its 
object  with  a  fatal  necessity  of  fulfilment,  even  so  the 
benediction  of  a  heart  oppressed  with  gratitude  might 
have  a  like  prerogative;  might  have  power  given  it  from 
above  to  chase,  to  haunt,  to  waylay,  to  pursue  tbee  into 
the  central  darkness  of  a  London  brothel,  or,  if  it  were 
possible,  even  into  the  darkness  of  a  grave,  there  to 
awaken  thee  with  an  authentic  message  of  peace  and 
forgiveness,  and  of  final  reconciliation!" 

With  the  loss  of  Ann  his  Greek-street  life  ended;  and 
becoming  reconciled  to  his  guardians  by  a  Providential 
occurrence,  he  went  home,  and  soon  after  entered  Oxford 
University  as  a  student.  Of  his  life  there  at  Worcester 
College,  we  know  almost  nothing.  It  was  so  hermit-like, 
that,  for  the  first  two  years,  he  computes  that  he  did  not 
ntter  one  hundred  words.  He  had  but  one  conversation 
with  his  tutor.  "It  consisted  of  three  sentences,"  he 
says,  "  two  of  which  fell  to  his  share,  one  to  mine.  Ox- 


THOMAS  DE  QUIKCEY.  25 

ford,  ancient  mother!  hoary  with  ancestral  honors,  time- 
honored,  and,  haply  it  may  be,  time-shattered  power,  I 
owe  thee  nothing!  Of  thy  vast  riches  I  took  not  a  shil 
ling,  though  living  among  multitudes  who  owed  thee  their 
daily  bread."  When  the  examinations  came,  De  Quincey 
went  through  the  first  day's  trial  so  triumphantly  that 
one  of  the  examiners  said  to  a  resident  of  Worcester  Col 
lege:  "You  have  sent  us  to-dav  the  cleverest  man  I  ever 

O  » 

met  with;  if  his  viva  voce  examination  to-morrow  corre 
spond  with  what  he  has  done  in  writing,  he  will  carry 
everything  before  him."  De  Quincey,  however,  did  not 
wait  to  be  questioned  further;  but  for  some  reason, — 
whether  self- distrust,  or  a  depression  of  spirits  following 
a  large  dose  of  opium, —  packed  his  trunk,  and  walked 
away  from  Oxford,  never  to  return.  In  1804  he  made 
the  acquaintance  of  Charles  Lamb.  In  1807  he  was  in 
troduced  to  Coleridge,  for  whose  vast  intellectual  powers 
he  had  a  profound  admiration;  and,  hearing  that  he  was 
harassed  by  pecuniary  troubles,  contrived  to  convey  to 
him,  through  Mr.  Cottle's  hand,  the  sum  of  £500.  In 
this  generous  gift  De  Quincey  was  actuated  by  a  pure 
artistic  love  of  genius  and  literature.  From  1808  to  1829, 
he  passed  nine  months  out  of  twelve  among  the  lakes 
and  mountains  of  Westmoreland.  He  took  a  lease  ol 
Wordsworth's  cottage  at  Grasmere,  wedded  a  gentle 
and  loving  wife;  and  amidst  the  delights  of  the  lake 
scenery,  a  good  library  of  5000  volumes,  lettered  friends, 
and  his  darling  drug,  realized  the  ideal  of  earthly  bliss 
for  which  the  Roman  poet  so  often  sighed,  and  drank  a 
sweet  oblivion  of  the  cares  of  anxious  life.  Speaking  at 
this  time  of  Wordsworth's  good  luck,  for  whose  benefit 
some  person  became  conveniently  defunct  whenever  he 


26  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

wanted  money,  De  Quincey  says:  "So  true  it  is,  that,  just 
as  Wordsworth  needed  a  place  and  a  fortune,  the  holder 
of  that  place  or  fortune  was  immediately  served  with  a 
notice  to  surrender  it.  So  certainly  was  this  impressed 
upon  my  belief  as  one  of  the  blind  necessities,  making 
up  the  prosperity  and  fixed  destiny  of  Wordsworth,  that, 
for  myself,  had  I  happened  to  know  of  any  peculiar  adapta 
tion  in  an  estate  or  office  of  mine  to  an  existing  need  of 
Wordsworth,  forthwith,  and,  with  the  speed  of  a  man 
running  for  his  life,  I  would  have  laid  it  down  at  his 
feet.  'Take  it,'  I  should  have  said;  'take  it,  or  in  three 
weeks  I  shall  be  a  dead  man."1 

It  was  in  1804,  at  the  age  of  19,  that  De  Quincey  first 
began  taking  opium,  to  ease  rheumatic  pains  in  the  face 
and  head.  This  dangerous  remedy  having  been  recom 
mended  to  him  by  a  fellow-student  at  Oxford,  he  entered 
a  druggist's  shop,  and,  like  Thalaba  in  the  witches'  lair, 
wound  about  himself  the  first  threads  of  a  coil,  which, 
after  the  most  gigantic  efforts,  he  was  never  able  wholly 
to  shake  off.  Using  opium  at  first  to  quiet  pain,  he  quickly 
found  that  it  had  mightier  and  more  magical  effects,  and 
went  on  increasing  the  doses  till  in  1816  he  was  taking 
320  grains,  or  8,000  drops  of  laudanum  a  day.  What  a 
picture  he  has  given  us  of  the  discovery  he  made!  What 
a  revelation  the  dark  but  subtle  drug  made  to  his  spiritual 
eyes!  What  an  agent  of  immortal  and  exalted  pleasures! 
What  an  apocalypse  of  the  world  within  him!  Here  was 
a  panacea  for  sorrow  and  suffering,  for  brain-ache  and 
heart-ache, —  immunity  from  pain,  and  care,  and  all  hu 
man  woes.  He  swallowed  a  bit  of  the  drug,  and  lo!  the 
inner  spirit's  eyes  were  opened, —  a  fairy  ministrant  had 
burst  into  wings,  waving  a  wondrous  wand, —  a  fresh  tree 


THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY.  27 

of  knowledge  had  yielded  its  fruit,  and  it  seemed  as  good 
as  it  was  beautiful.  "  Happiness  might  now  be  bought 
for  a  penny,  and  carried  in  the  waistcoat  pocket ;  portable 
ecstasies  might  now  be  had,  corked  up  in  a  pint  bottle; 
and  peace  of  mind  sent  down  in  gallons  by  mail.11  Here 
we  may  observe  that  De  Quincey  contradicts  the  state 
ments  which  are  usually  made  regarding  opium.  He 
denies  that  it  intoxicates,  and  shows  that  there  is  such 
an  insidiousness  about  it,  that  it  scarcely  seems  to  be  a 
gratification  of  the  senses.  The  pleasure  of  wine  is  one 
that  rises  to  a  certain  pitch,  and  then  degenerates  into 
stupidity,  while  that  of  opium  remains  stationary  for  eight 
or  ten  hours.  Again,  the  influence  of  wine  tends  to  dis 
order  the  mind,  while  opium  tends  to  exalt  the  ideas, 
and  yet  to  contribute  to  harmony  and  order  in  their  ar 
rangement.  "  The  opium-eater  feels  that  the  diviner  part 
of  his  nature  is  uppermost;  that  is,  the  moral  affections 
are  in  a  state  of  cloudless  serenity,  and  over  all  is  the 
great  light  of  the  majestic  intellect/1 

Up  to  the  middle  of  1817  De  Quincey  judges  himself 
to  have  been  a  happy  man;  and  nothing  can  be  more 
charming  than  the  picture  he  draws  of  the  interior  of 
his  cottage  in  a  stormy  winter  night,  with  "  warm  hearth 
rugs,  tea  from  an  eternal  tea-pot,'1 — eternal  a  parte  ante 
and  a  parte  post,  for  he  drank  from  eight  in  the  evening 
till  four  in  the  morning, — "  a  fair  tea-maker,  shutters  closed, 
curtains  flowing  in  ample  draperies  on  the  floor,  whilst 
the  wind  and  rain  are  raging  audibly  without, 

lAs  heaven  and  earth  they  would  together  mell.'" 

Alas !  that  this  blissful  state  could  not  continue !  But  the 
very  drug  which  had  revealed  to  him  such  an  abyss  of 
divine  enjoyment, —  which  had  given  to  him  the  keys  of 


28  THOMAS  DE  QUItfCEY. 

Paradise,  causing  to  pass  before  his  spirit's  eyes  a  never- 
ending  succession  of  splendid  imagery,  the  gorgeous  col 
oring  of  sky  and  cloud,  the  pomp  of  woods  and  forests, 
the  majesty  of  boundless  oceans,  and  the  grandeur  of 
imperial  cities,  while  to  the  ears,  cleansed  from  their 
mortal  infirmities,  were  borne  the  sublime  anthem  of  the 
winds  and  waves,  and  a  sevenfold  chorus  of  hallelujahs 
and  harping  symphonies, —  this  very  power  became  event 
ually  its  own  avenging  Nemesis,  and  inflicted  torments 
compared  with  which  those  of  Prometheus  were  as  the 
bites  of  a  gnat. 

Of  all  the  torments  which  opium  inflicts  upon  its  vo 
tary,  perhaps  there  is  no  one  more  destructive  of  his 
peace  than  the  sense  of  incapacity  and  feebleness, —  of 
inability  to  perform  duties  which  conscience  tells  him  he 
must  not  neglect.  The  opium-eater,  De  Quincey  tells  us, 
loses  none  of  his  moral  sensibilities  or  aspirations;  he  wishes 
and  longs  as  earnestly  as  ever  to  realize  what  he  believes 
possible,  and  feels  to  be  exacted  by  duty;  but  the  springs 
of  his  will  are  all  broken,  and  his  intellectual  apprehen 
sion  of  what  is  possible  infinitely  outruns  his  power,  not 
of  execution  only,  but  even  of  power  to  attempt.  "  He 
lies  under  the  weight  of  incubus  and  nightmare;  he  lies 
in  sight  of  all  that  he  would  fain  perform,  just  as  a 
man  forcibly  confined  to  his  bed  by  the  mortal  languor 
of  a  relaxing  disease,  who  is  compelled  to  witness  injury 
or  outrage  offered  to  some  object  of  his  tenderest  love: 
—  he  curses  the  spells  which  chain  him  down  from  motion ; 
he  would  lay  down  his  life  if  he  might  but  get  up  and 
walk;  but  he  is  powerless  as  an  infant,  and  cannot  even 
attempt  to  rise." 

Of  the  cup  of  horrors  which  opium  finally  presents  to 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  29 

its  devotees,  De  Quincey  drank  to  the  dregs,  especially  in 
his  dreams  at  night,  when  the  fearful  and  shadowy  phan 
toms  that  flitted  by  his  bedside  made  his  sleep  insuffera 
ble  by  the  terror  and  anguish  they  occasioned.  Of  these 
dreams,  as  portrayed  in  the  "  Confessions "  and  some  of 
his  other  writings,  we  doubt  if  it  would  be  possible  to 
find  a  parallel  in  any  literature,  ancient  or  modern. 
Sometimes  they  are  blended  with  appalling  associations, 
—  encompassed  with  the  power  of  darkness,  or  shrouded 
with  the  mysteries  of  death  and  the  gloom  of  the  grave. 
Now  they  are  pervaded  with  unimaginable  horrors  of 
oriental  imagery  and  mythological  tortures;  the  dreamer 
is  oppressed  with  tropical  heat  and  vertical  sunlight,  and 
brings  together  all  the  physical  prodigies  of  China  and 
Hindostan.  He  runs  into  pagodas,  and  is  fixed  for  cen 
turies  at  the  summit,  or  in  secret  rooms;  he  flees  from 
the  wrath  of  Brahma  through  all  the  forests  of  Asia; 
Vishnu  hates  him;  Seeva  lays  wait  for  him;  he  comes 
suddenly  on  Isis  and  Osiris;  he  has  done  a  deed,  they 
say,  at  which  the  ibis  and  the  crocodile  tremble;  he  is 
buried  for  a  thousand  years  in  stone  coffins,  with  mum 
mies  and  sphinxes,  in  narrow  chambers  at  the  heart  of 
eternal  pyramids.  He  is  kissed  with  cancerous  kisses  by 
crocodiles ;  and  laid,  confounded  with  all  unutterable,  slimy 
things,  amongst  reeds  and  Nilotic  mud. 

"Over  every  form,  and  threat,  and  punishment,  and  dim  sightless  incar 
ceration,  brooded  a'  sense  of  eternity  and  infinity  that  drove  me  into  an 
oppression  as  of  madness.  Into  these  dreams  only,  it  was,  with  one  or  two 
slight  exceptions,  that  any  circumstances  of  physical  horror  entered.  All 
before  had  been  moral  and  spiritual  terrors.  But  here  the  main  agents  were 
ugly  birds,  or  snakes,  or  crocodiles,  especially  the  last.  The  cursed  crocodile 
became  to  me  the  object  of  more  horror  than  almost  all  the  rest.  I  was 
compelled  to  live  with  him ;  and  (as  was  always  the  case,  almost,  in  my 
dreams)  for  centuries.  I  escaped  sometimes,  and  found  myself  in  Chinese 


30  THOMAS   DE  QTJINCEY. 

houses  with  cane  tables,  etc.  All  the  feet  of  the  tables,  sofas,  etc.,  soon 
became  instinct  with  life:  the  abominable  head  of  the  crocodile,  and  his 
leering  eyes,  looked  out  at  me,  multiplied  into  a  thousand  repetitions;  and  I 
stood  loathing  and  fascinated.  And  so  often  did  this  hideous  reptile  haunt 
my  dreams,  that  many  times  the  very  same  dream  was  broken  up  in  the  very 
same  way:  I  heard  gentle  voices  speaking  to  me  (I  hear  everything  when  I 
am  sleeping),  and  instantly  I  awoke  :  it  was  broad  noon,  and  my  children 
were  standing,  hand  in  hand,  at  my  bedside;  come  to  show  me  their  colored 
shoes,  or  new  frocks,  or  to  let  me  see  them  dressed  for  going  out.  I  protest 
that  so  awful  was  the  transition  from  the  damned  crocodile,  and  the  other 
unutterable  monsters  and  abortions  of  my  dreams,  to  the  sight  of  innocent 
human  natures  and  of  infancy,  that,  in  the  mighty  and  sudden  revulsion  of 
mind,  I  wept,  and  could  not  forbear  it,  as  I  kissed  their  faces." 

Anon,  there  would  come  suddenly  a  dream  of  a  fai 
different  character, —  a  tumultuous  dream, —  commencing 
with  music,  and  a  multitudinous  movement  of  infinite 
cavalcades  filing  off,  and  the  tread  of  innumerable  armies. 
The  morning  was  come  of  a  mighty  day, —  a  day  of  crisis 
and  of  ultimate  hope  for  human  nature,  then  suffering 
mysterious  eclipse,  and  laboring  in  some  dread  extremity. 

"Somewhere,  but  I  knew  not  where, —  somehow,  but  I  knew  not  how, — 
by  some  beings,  I  knew  not  by  whom,— a  battle,  a  strife,  an  agony  was 
traveling  through  all  its  stages, —  was  evolving  itself  like  the  catastrophe  of 
some  mighty  drama,  with  which  my  sympathy  was  the  more  insupportable, 
from  deepening  confusion  as  to  its  local  scene,  its  cause,  its  nature,  and  its 
undecipherable  issue.  I  (as  is  usual  in  dreams,  where,  of  necessity,  we  make 
ourselves  central  to  every  movement,)  had  the  power,  and  yet  had  not  the 
power,  to  decide  it.  I  had  the  power,  if  I  could  raise  myself  to  will  it;  and 
yet  again  had  not  the  power,  for  the  weight  of  twenty  Atlantics  was  upon 
me,  or  the  oppression  of  inexpiable  guilt.  '  Deeper  than  ever  plummet 
sounded,'  I  lay  inactive.  Then,  like  a  chorus,  the  passion  deepened.  Some 
greater  interest  was  at  stake,  some  mightier  cause,  than  ever  yet  the  sword 
had  pleaded,  or  trumpet  had  proclaimed.  Then  came  sudden  alarms,  hurry 
ings  to  and  fro,  trepidations  of  innumerable  fugitives,— I  knew  not  whether 
from  the  good  cause  or  the  bad;  darkness  and  lights;  tempest  and  human 
faces;  and,  at  last,  with  the  sense  that  all  was  lost,  female  forms,  and  the 
features  that  were  worth  all  the  world  to  me;  and  but  a  moment  allowed,— 
and  clasped  hands,  with  heart-breaking  partings,  and  then  — everlasting  fare 
wells;  and  with  a  sigh  such  as  the  caves  of  hell  sighed,  when  the  incestuous 
mother  uttered  the  abhorred  name  of  death,  the  sound  was  reverberated,— 
everlasting  farewells  I  and  again,  and  yet  again  reverberated,— everlasting 
farewells!" 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  31 

When  did  ever  man,  like  this  man,  realize  "the  fierce 
vexation  of  a  dream"  ?  As  with  Byron's  Manfred,  the  voice 
of  incantation  rang  forever  in  his  ears:  — 

"Though  thy  slumber  may  be  deep, 
Yet  thy  spirit  shall  not  sleep; 
There  are  shades  which  will  not  vanish, 
There  are  thoughts  thou  canst  not  banish; 
—  And  to  thee  shall  night  deny 
All  the  quiet  of  her  sky." 

How  fearfully  does  he  make  us  feel  that 

"  This  is  truth  the  poet  sings, 
That  a  sorrow's  crown  of  sorrows  is  remembering  happier  things;" 

and  we  would  fain  say  to  him: 

"  Drug  thy  memories,  lest  thou  learn  it,  lest  thy  heart  be  put  to  proof, 
In  the  dead  unhappy  night,  and  when  the  rain  is  on  the  roof." 

Here,  were  it  not  needless,  we  might  pause  to  speak  of 
the  egregious  folly  of  those  persons  who  fancy  that  by 
swallowing  opium  like  De  Quincey,  they  may  have  De 
Quincey' s  visions  and  dreams.  As  well  might  they  expect 
to  produce  an  explosion  by  touching  a  match,  not  to  gun 
powder,  but  to  a  lump  of  lead.  Opium  was,  indeed,  the 
teasing  irritant  of  De  Quincey's  genius;  but  the  genius 
was  in  him,  or  the  visions  would  not  have  come.  Dryden 
was  most  inspired  after  a  dose  of  salts;  but  a  common 
place  man  will  never  be  able  to  dash  off  an  "Alexander's 
Feast,"  though  he  take  pills  till  he  bankrupt  Brandreth. 
He  will  have  "  all  the  contortions  of  the  Sibyl  without 
the  inspiration."  A  booby  will  remain  a  booby  still, 
though  he  feed  upon  the  nectar  and  ambrosia  of  the  gods. 

Having  yielded  to  the  Circean  spells  of  opium,  De 
Quincey  lay  from  1817  to  1821  in  a  kind  of  intellectual 
torpor,  utterly  incapable  of  sustained  exertion.  At  last, 
his  nightly  visions  became  so  insupportable  that  he  deter- 


32  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

mined  to  abjure  the  deadly  drug;  and,  after  a  desperate 
struggle,  the  foul  fiend  was  nearly  exorcised.  But  long 
after  its  departure,  he  suffered  most  keenly;  his  sleep 
was  still  tumultuous;  and  like  the  gates  of  Paradise  to 
our  first  parents  when  looking  back  from  afar,  it  was 
still  (in  the  tremendous  line  of  Milton) 

"  With  dreadful  faces  thronged  and  fiery  arms." 

It  was  at  this  time  that  he  began  those  literary  labors 
which  have  made  his  fame,  and  which  have  enabled  the 
world  to  see  what  mighty  results  he  might  have  accom 
plished,  if  opium  had  not  enfeebled  his  powers.  Writing 
the  first  part  of  the  "  Confessions  "  in  1821,  he  from  that 
time  plied  his  pen  with  great,  but  fitful  industry,  on  vari 
ous  publications,  such  as  "  Blackwood's  Magazine,"  "  Tart's," 
the  "  North  British  Review,"  "  Hogg's  Instructor,"  and  the 
"Encyclopaedia  Britannica."  Till  1827  he  continued  to 
live  at  Grasmere,  with  occasional  visits  to  London,  when  he 
changed  his  residence  for  two  years  to  Edinburgh, —  after 
which  he  took  up  his  abode  again  among  the  Westmore 
land  hills,  in  a  "  rich  farm-house,  flowing  with  milk  and 
honey,  with  mighty  barns  and  spacious  pastures,"  near 
his  former  cottage  at  Grasmere.  To  this  charming  rural 
retreat  he  invited  Charles  Knight  and  his  family  to  visit 
him,  in  a  letter  such  as  only  the  Opium-Eater  could 
write.  "And  now,  my  friend,"  he  urges,  "think  what  a 
glorious  El  Dorado  of  milk  and  butter,  and  cream  cheeses, 
and  all  other  dairy  products,  I  can  offer  you  morning, 
noon,  and  night.  You  may  absolutely  bathe  in  new 
milk,  or  even  in  cream;  and  you  shall  bathe,  if  you  like 
it.  I  know  that  you  care  not  much  for  luxuries  for  the 
dinner-table;  else,  though  our  luxuries  are  few  and 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  33 

simple,  I  could  offer  you  some  temptations, —  mountain 
lamb  equal  to  Welsh;  char  famous  to  the  antipodes; 
trout  and  pike  from  the  very  lake  within  twenty-five  feet 
of  our  door;  bread,  such  as  you  have  never  presumed  to 
dream  of,  made  of  our  own  wheat,  not  doctored  and 
separalfed  by  the  usual  miller's  process  into  fine  insip 
flour,  and  coarse,  that  is,  merely  dirty-looking  white,  but 
all  ground  down  together,  which  is  the  sole  receipt 
(experto  crede)  for  having  rich,  lustrous,  red-brown, 
ambrosial  bread;  new  potatoes,  of  celestial  earthiness  and 
raciness,  which,  with  us,  last  to  October;  and  finally, 
milk,  milk,  milk  —  cream,  cream,  cream,  (hear  it,  thou 
benighted  Londoner!)  in  which  you  must  and  shall 
bathe."  De  Quincey's  last  years  were  spent  at  Lasswade, 
near  Edinburgh,  Scotland,  where  he  died  December  8, 
1859,  in  his  seventy-fifth  year.  During  the  last  three 
or  four  years  of  his  life,  he  suffered  exquisite  pain  from 
a  constant  gnawing  in  the  stomach,  which  impelled  him 
some  days  to  walk  fifteen  miles  at  a  time,  and  which  he 
believed  was  owing  to  the  presence  there  of  a  voracious 
living  parasite.  But  for  his  obligations  to  his  wife  and 
daughters,  he  declared,  the  temptation  to  commit  suicide 
would  have  been  greater  than  he  could  have  resisted; 
and  he  repeatedly  announced  his  intention  of  bequeath 
ing  his  body  to  the  surgeons  for  a  post  mortem  examina 
tion  into  his  strange  disease. 

Physically,  De  Quincey  was  a  frail,  slender-looking 
man,  exceedingly  diminutive  in  stature,  with  small, 
clearly-chiselled  features,  as  pale  almost  as  alabaster,  a 
large  head,  and  a  singularly  high,  square  forehead.  The 
head  showed  behind  a  want  of  animal  force.  The  lips 
were  curiously  expressive  and  subtle  in  their  character; 


34  THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY. 

the  eyes,  that  seemed  to  have  seen  much  sorrow,  peered 
out  of  two  rings  of  darkness;  and  there  was  a  peculiarly 
high  and  regular  arch  in  the  wrinkles  of  his  brow, 
which  was  "loaded  with  thought."  All  that  met  him 
were  struck  with  the  measured,  silvery,  yet  somewhat 
hollow  and  unearthly  tones  of  his  voice,  the  more 
impressive  that  the  flow  of  his  talk  was  unhesitating  and 
unbroken.  Though  capable  of  undergoing  a  great  deal 
of  labor  and  fatigue,  he  declares  that  his  body  was  the 
very  ideal  of  a  base,  crazy,  despicable  human  system, 
and  that  he  "  should  almost  have  been  ashamed  to 
bequeath  his  wretched  structure  to  any  respectable  dog." 
Of  his  odd,  eccentric  character,  no  adequate  account  ever 
has  been,  or,  probably  ever  will  be  given,  so  removed 
were  his  from  all  the  normal  conditions  of  human  nature. 
In  his  boyhood  the  shiest  of  children,  "  naturally  dedi 
cated  to  despondency,"  he  was  passionately  fond  of  peace, 
—  had  a  perfect  craze  for  being  despised, —  considered 
contempt  as  the  only  security  for  unmolested  repose, — 
and  always  sought  to  hide  his  accomplishments  from  the 
curiosity  of  strangers.  He  tells  us  humorously,  and  no 
doubt  truthfully,  how,  after  he  had  reached  manhood,  he 
was  horrified  at  a  party  in  London  when  he  saw  a  large 
number  of  guests  filing  in  one  by  one,  and  guessed  from 
their  looks  that  they  had  come  to  "lionize"  the  Opium- 
Eater.  It  has  been  questioned  if  he  ever  knew  what  it 
is  "  to  eat  a  good  dinner,"  or  could  even  comprehend  the 
nature  of  such  a  felicity.  He  had  an  ear  most  perfectly 
attuned  to  the  enjoyment  of  "  beauty  born  of  murmuring 
sound,"  and  one  of  his  most  exquisite  pleasures  was 
listening  to  instrumental,  and  especially  vocal,  music; 
yet  a  discord,  a  wrong  note,  was  agony  to  him;  and  it 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  35 

is  said  that,  on  one  occasion,  he  with  ludicrous  solem 
nity  apostrophized  his  unhappy  fate  as  one  over  whom  a 
cloud  of  the  darkest  despair  had  been  drawn,  because  a 
peacock  had  just  come  to  live  within  hearing  distance 
of  him,  and  not  only  the  terrific  yells  of  the  accursed 
biped  pierced  him  to  the  soul,  but  the  continued  terror 
of  their  recurrence  kept  his  nerves  in  agonizing  tension 
during  the  intervals  of  silence.  In  this  sensitiveness  to 
harsh  noises  he  reminds  one  of  the  poet  Beattie,  who 
denounces  chanticleer  for  his  lusty  proclamation  of  morn 
ing  to  his  own  and  the  neighboring  farm-yards,  in  terms 
hardly  merited  by  a  Nero. 

In  everything  that  concerned  the  happiness  of  others, 
DeQuincey  was  the  very  soul  of  courtesy.  A  gentleman 
who  visited  him  repeatedly  at  Lasswade,  tells  us  that  for 
every  woman,  however  humble,  he  seemed  to  have  the 
profoundest  reverence;  and  when,  in  walking  along  the 
country  highway  together,  they  met  any  person  in  female 
attire,  however  lowly  or  meanly  clad, —  were  she  fine  lady 
or  servant  girl, —  DeQuincey  would  turn  aside  from  the 
road,  back  up  against  the  hedge,  and  pulling  off  his  hat, 
bow  and  continue  bowing  profoundly,  till  she  had  passed 
beyond  them.  While  listening  to  the  mythical  and  fear 
fully  wearisome  recital  of  an  old  crone  at  Melrose  Abbey, 
he  continued  bowing,  with  his  hat  off,  to  the  end,  with  as 
much  deference  as  if  she  had  been  a  duchess.  A  corre 
spondent  of  a  New  York  journal,  who  spent  some  hours  at 
his  Scottish  home,  gives  an  additional  illustration  of  his 
tender  regard  for  the  feelings  of  the  lowly: — 

"  There  was  a  few  moments'  pause  in  the  '  table  talk,'  when  one  of  the 
daughters  asked  our  opinion  of  Scotland  and  the  Scotch.  De  Quincey  had 
heen  in  a  kind  of  reverie,  from  which  the  question  aroused  him.  Turning 
to  us,  he  said,  in  a  kindly,  half-paternal  manner,  '  The  servant  that  waits  at 


36  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

my  table  is  a  Scotch  girl.  It  may  be  that  you  have  something  severe  to  say 
about  Scotland.  I  know  that  I  like  the  English  church  and  dislike  many 
things  about  the  Puritanical  Scotch;  but  I  never  utter  anything  that  might 
wound  my  servant.  Heaven  knows  that  the  lot  of  a  poor  servant  girl  is  hard 
enough,  and  if  there  is  any  person  in  the  world  of  whose  feelings  I  am 
especially  tender,  it  is  those  of  a  female  compelled  to  do  for  us  our  drudgery. 
Speak  as  freely  as  you  choose,  but  please  reserve  your  censure,  if  you  have 
any,  for  the  moments  when  she  is  absent  from  the  room.'  Un  gentilhomme 
est  touj&urs  un  gentilhomme,  a  man  of  true  sensibility  and  courtesy  will 
manifest  it  on  all  occasions,  toward  the  powerless  as  well  as  toward  the 
strong.  When  the  dinner  was  ended  and  the  waiting  girl  had  left,  his  elo 
quent  tongue  gave  the  Ultra  Puritanism  of  Scotland  such  a  castigation,  that 
we  looked  around  us  with  a  shudder,  expecting  to  see  the  ghost  of  John 
Knox  stalking  into  the  room,  fluid-hot  with  holy  wrath." 

Though  the  author  of  a  profound,  philosophic  treatise 
on  political  economy,  DeQuincey  was  in  all  money  matters 
a  child.  Brooding  over  great  intellectual  problems,  he 
gave  no  thought  to  pounds,  shillings,  and  pence,  or  ques 
tions  touching  the  payment  of  weekly  bills.  Only  the  most 
immediate,  craving  necessities  could  extract  from  him  an 
acknowledgment  of  the  vulgar  agencies  by  which  men 
subsist  in  civilized  society;  and  only  while  the  necessity 
lasted,  did  the  acknowledgment  exist.  He  would  arrive 
late  at  a  friend's  door,  and  represent  in  his  usual  silvery 
voice  and  measured  rhetoric,  the  urgent  necessity  he  had 
for  the  immediate  and  absolute  use  of  a  certain  sum  of 
money;  and  if  he  thought  the  friend  hesitated,  or  the  time 
seemed  long  before  the  required  loan  was  forthcoming, —  a 
loan,  perhaps,  of  seven  shillings  and  sixpence, —  he  would 
rummage  his  waistcoat  pocket  in  search  of  a  document 
which,  he  would  confidently  declare,  was  an  ample  security, 
and  which  would  prove  to  be,  when  the  crumpled  paper 
was  spread  out,  a  bank  note  for  £50 !  It  was  the  opinion 
of  those  who  knew  him  well,  that,  had  the  bank  note  been 
accepted,  his  friend  would  never  have  heard  anything  more 
of  the  transaction. 


THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY.  37 

Mr.  John  Hill  Burton,  in  "  The  Book-Hunter,"  to  which  we 
are  indebted  for  these  particulars,  has  related  a  variety  of 
other  incidents,  similarly  illustrative  of  De  Quincey's  char 
acter.  Sometimes  a  visitor  of  De  Quincey,  made  oblivious  of 
the  lapse  of  time  by  the  charm  of  his  conversation,  would  dis 
cover,  at  a  late  hour,  that  "  lang  Scots1  miles  "  lay  between 
his  host's  and  his  own  home.  Thereupon  De  Quincey  would 
volunteer  to  accompany  the  forlorn  traveler,  and  guide 
him  through  the  difficulties  of  the  way;  for  had  not  his 
midnight  wanderings  and  musings  made  him  familiar  with 
all  the  intricacies  of  the  road?  Roofed  by  a  huge  wide 
awake,  which  makes  his  tiny  figure  look  like  the  stalk  of  some 
great  fungus,  with  a  lantern  of  more  than  common  dimen 
sions  in  his  hand,  away  he  goes,  down  the  wooded  path,  up 
the  steep  bank,  along  Hie  brawling  stream,  and  across  the 
waterfall;  and  ever  as  he  goes,  there  comes  from  him  a 
continued  stream  of  talk  concerning  the  philosophy  of 
Immanuel  Kant,  and  other  kindred  themes.  Having  seen 
his  guest  home,  he  would  still  continue  walking  on,  until, 
weariness  overtaking  him,  he  would  take  his  rest  like  some 
poor  mendicant,  under  a  hayrick,  or  in  a  wet  furrow.  No 
wonder  that  he  used  to  denounce,  with  fervent  eloquence, 
that  barbarous  and  brutal  provision  of  the  law  of  England 
which  rendered  sleeping  in  the  open  air  an  act  of  vagrancy, 
and  so  punishable,  if  the  sleeper  could  not  give  a  satis 
factory  account  of  himself;  "  a  thing,"  adds  Mr.  Burton, 
"  which  he  could  never  give  under  any  circumstances." 
His  social  habits  were  as  eccentric  as  everything  else  per 
taining  to  him.  Being  detained  one  evening  at  Prof. 
Wilson's  in  Edinburgh,  when  in  a  great  hurry,  by  a 
shower,  he  remained  nearly  a  year.  Mrs.  Gordon,  Prof. 
Wilson's  daughter,  states  that  at  this  time  his  dose  of 


38  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

laudanum  was  an  ounce  a  day, —  an  amount  which,  though 
small  compared  with  what  he  had  formerly  taken,  was 
sufficient  to  prostrate  animal  life  in  the  morning.  "  It  was 
no  unfrequent  sight,"  she  says,  "  to  find  him  in  his  room, 
lying  upon  the  rug  in  front  of  the  fire,  his  head  resting 
upon  a  book,  with  his  arms  crossed  over  his  breast,  plunged 
into  profound  slumber.  For  several  hours  he  would  lie  in 
this  state,  until  the  effect  of  the  torpor  had  passed  away." 

When  he  was  invited  to  a  dinner-party,  no  one  ever 
thought  of  waiting  dinner  for  him.  He  came  and  departed 
always  at  his  own  sweet  will,  neither  burdened  with  punct 
ualities,  nor  burdening  others  by  exacting  them.  "  The 
festivities  of  the  afternoon  are  far  on  when  a  commotion 
is  heard  in  the  hall,  as  if  some  dog,  or  other  stray  animal 
had  forced  its  way  in.  The  instinct  of  a  friendly  guest 
tells  him  of  the  arrival ;  he  opens  the  door,  and  fetches  in 
the  little  stranger.  What  can  it  be?  a  street-boy  of  some 
sort?  His  costume,  in  fact,  is  a  boy's  duffle  great  coat, 
very  threadbare,  with  a  hole  in  it,  and  buttoned  tight  to 
the  chin,  where  it  meets  the  fragments  of  a  parti-colored 
belcher  handkerchief;  on  his  feet  are  list-shoes,  covered 
with  snow,  for  it  is  a  stormy  winter  night;  and  the  trousers, 
— some  one  suggests  that  they  are  inner  linen  garments 
blackened  with  writing-ink ;  but  De  Quincey  never  would 
have  been  at  the  trouble  so  to  disguise  them.  What  can 
be  the  theory  of  such  a  costume?  The  simplest  thing  in 
the  world, —  it  consisted  of  the  fragments  of  apparel  nearest 
at  hand.  Had  chance  thrown  to  him  a  court  single-breasted 
coat,  with  a  bishop's  apron,  a  kilt,  and  top  boots,  in  these 
he  would  have  made  his  entry."  One  of  his  peculiarities 
was  an  intense  dislike  for  shirts, —  of  wearing  which  he  was 
as  innocent  as  Adam.  Unlike  Coleridge's  father,  who, 


THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY.  39 

starting  on  a  journey  with  six  shirts,  came  home  wearing 
the  entire  half  dozen,  DeQuincey  sloughed  off  this  garment 
almost  as  soon  as  his  good  wife  had  persuaded  him  to  put 
it  on. 

DeQuincey  was  a  prodigious  reader,  had  an  anaconda- 
like  digestion,  and  assimilated  his  mental  food  with  amazing 
rapidity.  An  ardent  lover  of  books,  he  cared  nothing  for 
pet  editions, —  the  niceties  a  ad  luxuries  of  paper,  printing, 
and  binding.  Tree-calf  and  sheep,  Turkey-morocco  and 
muslin, —  were  all  one  to  him.  His  pursuit  of  books  was 
like  that  of  the  savage  who  £ieeks  but  to  appease  the  hunger 
of  the  moment.  Mr.  Burton  says  that  if  his  intellectual 
appetite  craved  a  passage  in  the  (Edipus,  or  in  the  Medeia, 
or  in  Plato's  Republic,  he  would  be  content  with  the  most 
tattered  fragment  of  the  volume,  if  it  contained  what  he 
wanted;  but  on  the  other  hand,  he  would  not  hesitate  to 
seize  upon  your  tall  copy  in  Russia,  gilt  and  tooled.  Nor 
would  he  hesitate  to  lay  his  sacrilegious  hands  upon  an 
editio  princeps, —  even  to  wrench  out  the  twentieth  volume 
of  your  "  Encyclopedic  Methodique  "  or  "  Ersch  und  Gruber," 
leaving  a  vacancy  like  an  extracted  front  tooth,  and  carry 
ing  it  off  to  his  den  of  Cacus.  "  Some  legend  there  is," 
says  the  same  amusing  writer,  "  of  a  book-creditor  having 
forced  his  way  into  the  Cacus  den,  and  there  seen  a  sort  of 
rubble  work  inner  wall  of  volumes,  with  their  edges  out 
ward;  while  others,  bound  and  unbound,  the  plebeian 
sheepskin  and  the  aristocratic  Russian,  were  squeezed  into 
certain  tubs  drawn  from  the  washing  establishment  of  a 
confiding  landlady."  In  common  with  the  whole  tribe  of 
book-borrowers,  he  rarely  returned  a  book  loaned  to  him, 
folio  or  quarto,  single  or  one  of  a  set;  though  sometimes 
the  book  was  recognized  at  large,  greatly  enhanced  in  value 


40  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

by  a  profuse  edging  of  manuscript  notes.  When  short  of 
writing  paper,  he  never  hesitated  to  tear  out  the  leaves  of  a 
broad-margined  book,  whether  his  own  or  belonging  to 
another.  It  is  even  reported  that  he  once  gave  in  "copy" 
written  "  on  the  edges  of  a  tall  octavo  Somnium  Scipionis; 
and  as  he  did  not  obliterate  the  original  matter,  the  printer 
was  rather  puzzled,  and  made  a  funny  jumble  between  the 
letter-press  Latin  and  the  manuscript  English."  It  is 
a  remarkable  fact  that,  in  spite  of  these  piratical  proceed 
ings,  none  of  his  friends  ever  complained  of  him.  They 
never  said,  as  did  Southey  of  Wordsworth,  that  letting  him 
into  one's  library  was  "  like  letting  a  bear  into  a  tulip 
garden." 

DeQuincey's  indifference  to  the  fate  of  his  printed  writ 
ings  is  a  peculiarity  not  less  marked  than  the  other  traits 
of  his  strange,  prismatic  genius.  Not  till  the  very  end  of 
his  life,  and  then,  we  believe,  only  at  the  suggestion  of  an 
American  publisher,  did  he  set  about  collecting  his  scattered 
papers, — a  feat  which  he  once  declared  "that  not  the 
archangel  Gabriel,  nor  his  multipotent  adversary,  durst 
attempt.1'  It  is  to  the  honor  of  our  country  that,  like  the 
splendid  essays  of  Macaulay,  the  twenty-four  volumes  of 
the  Opium-Eater's  writings  were  first  published  in  Boston; 
and  it  would  be  pleasant  to  see  confirmed  a  statement  we 
have  met  with  in  a  New  York  newspaper,  that  during  the 
closing  years  of  his  life,  the  broad  and  brilliant  sunrise  of 
his  fame  in  the  United  States  did  more  than  any  other 
single  thing  to  stimulate  him  to  continuous  literary  labor 
and  to  kindle  his  literary  enthusiasm. 

Turning  from  De  Quincey  the  man  to  De  Quincey  the 
author,  the  first  thing  that  strikes  us  is  the  extraordinary 
depth  and  compass  of  his  knowledge.  He  never  seems  to 


THOMAS   DE  QTJINCEY.  41 

put  forth  all  his  learning  on  any  subject,  nor  are  there 
any  signs  of  "  cram  "  in  his  writings.  His  thought  comes 
from  a  brimming  reservoir,  and  never  shows  the  mud 
at  the  bottom.  Indeed,  we  know  of  no  man  who  more 
completely  realizes  his  own  wonderful  description  of  a 
great  scholar,  as  "  one  endowed  not  merely  with  a  great 
memory,  but  with  an  infinite  and  electrical  power  of 
combination,  bringing  together  from  the  four  winds, 
like  the  angels  of  the  resurrection,  what  else  were  but 
the  dust  of  dead  men's  bones,  and  breathing  into  them 
the  unity  of  life." 

When  we  consider  the  number  and  variety  of  the 
themes  he  has  discussed,  many  of  them  of  the  most 
recondite,  out-of-the-way  character,  and  especially  when 
we  think  of  his  digressions,  quotations,  notes,  allusions, 
and  extrajudicial  opinions,  we  are  astonished  at  the  vast 
and  eccentric  range  of  his  reading,  and  still  more  at  the 
tenacity  of  a  memory  by  which  such  portentous  acqui 
sitions  could  be  held.  He  seems  to  have  been  his  own 
encyclopaedia,  quoting,  wherever  he  chanced  to  be,  all 
that  he  wished  to  quote,  even  dates  and  references,  with 
out  the  aid  of  a  library.  Ranging  over  all  the  fields  of 
inquiry,  he  is  perpetually  surprising  you  with  side 
glimpses  and  hints  of  truths  which  he  cannot  at  present 
follow  up.  Often  on  a  topic  seemingly  the  most  remote 
from  abstract  philosophy,  through  a  m'ere  allusion  or 
hint,  chasms  are  opened  to  you  in  the  depths  of  specu 
lation,  and  the  ghosts  of  buried  mediaeval  problems  are 
made  to  stalk  before  you.  We  know  of  no  other  memory 
which  is  so  large  as  De  Quincey's,  and  yet  so  personal ; 
so  ample,  and  yet  so  accurate;  which  is  at  once  so  object 
ive,  and  yet  so  subjective, —  giving  the  vividness  of  self 


42  THOMAS  DE  QUINCEY. 

to  outward  acquisition,  and   to   the  consciousness  of  self 
the  enlargement  of  imperial  knowledge. 

Again,  it  is  rarely  that  a  scholar,  especially  one  who 
has  spent  so  much  time  in  the  nooks  and  hidden  corners 
of  learning,  has  been  so  close  an  observer  of  character. 
All  of  his  works,  but  especially  his  "Autobiographic 
Sketches "  and  "  Literary  Reminiscences,"  are  strewn 
with  passages  showing  that  while  it  was  a  peculiarity 
of  his  intellect  to  be  exquisitely  introspective,  he  was 
yet  marvellously  swift  in  his  appreciations  of  men  and 
things,  and  noted  personal  traits  with  Boswellian  minute 
ness.  In  discovering  motives  and  feelings  by  their  outward 
manifestations, —  by  the  most  microscopic  peculiarities  of 
look,  shape,  tone,  or  gesture, —  he  was  as  acute  as  Lavater. 
Another  rare  endowment,  which  he  has  to  a  wonderful 
degree,  is  the  power  of  detecting  resemblances, —  hidden 
analogies, —  parallelisms,  connecting  things  otherwise 
wholly  remote.  Often,  he  tells  us,  he  was  mortified 
by  compliments  to  his  memory,  which,  in  fact,  were  due 
to  "  the  far  higher  faculty  of  an  electric  aptitude  for 
seizing  analogies,  and,  by  means  of  these  aerial  pontoons, 
passing  over  like  lightning  from  one  topic  to  another." 
To  this  power  we  may  trace  much  of  the  excellence  of 
his  criticism,  the  keenness  of  penetration  with  which  he 
sees,  not  only  into  the  genius,  but  all  round  the  life  of 
an  author.  Perhaps  no  literary  critic  has  equalled  him 
in  making  incidents  in  a  writer's  life,  unnoticed  by  other 
men,  flash  light  upon  his  genius;  and,  again,  in  making 
hidden  peculiarities  of  his  genius  clear  up  mysteries  in 
his  life.  Hence  he  never  repeats  the  old,  worn-out 
commonplaces  of  criticism,  but,  breaking  away  from  the 
traditional  views,  startles  you  with  opinions  as  novel  as 
they  are  acute  and  ingenious. 


THOMAS   DE  QUI^CEY.  43 

Who  can  forget  his  original  and  admirable  distinction 
between  the  literature  of  knowledge  and  the  literature  of 
power?  "  What,"  he  asks,  "  do  you  learn  from  Paradise 
Lost?  Nothing  at  all.  What  do  you  learn  from  a 
cookery  book?  Something  new,  something  you  did  not 
know  before,  in  every  paragraph.  But  would  you  there 
fore  put  the  wretched  cookery  book  on  a  higher  level  of 
estimation  than  the  divine  poem?  What  you  owe  to 
Milton  is  not  any  knowledge,  of  which  a  million  separate 
items  are  still  but  a  million  of  advancing  steps  on  the 
same  earthly  level;  what  you  owe  is  power;  that  is, 
exercise  and  expansion  to  your  own  latent  capacity  of 
sympathy  with  the  infinite,  where  every  pulse  and  each 
separate  influx  is  a  step  upward, —  a  step  ascending,  as 
upon  a  Jacob's  ladder,  from  earth  to  mysterious  altitudes 
above  the  earth.  All  the  steps  of  knowledge,  from  the 
first  to  the  last,  carry  you  farther  on  the  same  plane, 
but  could  never  raise  you  one  foot  above  your  ancient 
level  of  earth;  whereas  the  very  first  step  in  power  is  a 
flight,  is  an  ascending,  into  another  element,  where  earth 
is  forgotten." 

Again:  how  charming  to  a  lover  of  intellectual  sub 
tlety  is  his  reasoning  concerning  the  Essenes!  With 
what  a  keenness  of  philosophical  criticism, —  with  what 
a  prodigality  of  learning,  logic,  and  illustration, —  does 
DeQuincey  refute  the  popular  dogmas  about  Pope;  that 
he  was  a  writer  of  the  Gallic  school;  that  he  was  a  second 
or  third  rate  poet,  and  that  his  distinctive  merit  was  cor 
rectness;  when  he  was,  in  fact,  a  great,  impassioned, 
musical  thinker  of  social  life,  who  had  in  his  soul  innate 
germs  of  grandeur,  which  did  not  open  into  power,  or 
which  had  but  an  imperfect  growth.  Again:  how  adroitly 


44  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

he  unmasks  and  scalps  the  superficially  omniscient  and 
overrated  Brougham,  who  has  "  deluged  Demosthenes  with 
his  wordy  admiration!"  With  how  firm  a  grasp  he 
throttles  "  Junius";  how  keenly  he  dissects  that  brilliant 
mocking-bird,  Sheridan;  and  how  hollow  the  pompous 
Parr  feels  in  his  grip!  This  exquisite  subtlety  in  dis 
criminating  the  resemblances  and  differences  of  things  is 
one  of  the  most  remarkable  traits  of  De  Quincey's  genius. 
In  this,  as  in  the  wide  range  of  his  intellectual  sympathies, 
and  in  his  habit  of  minute]/  dissecting  his  own  emotions, 
he  resembled  Coleridge ;  but  in  other  respects  they  stood  in 
almost  polar  antithesis.  De  Quincey,  it  has  been  truly  said, 
was  a  Greek;  but  Coleridge  was  essentially  a  German  in 
his  culture,  tastes,  and  habits  of  mind.  De  Quincey  had 
a  dry,  acute,  critical  intellect,  piercing  as  a  sword-blade, 
and  as  brilliant  and  relentless;  Coleridge  was  a  poet,  of 
"  imagination  all  compact,"  with  a  mind  of  tropical  fruit- 
fulness  and  splendor,  and  a  sensibility  as  delicate  as  a 
woman's.  In  thus  differentiating  De  Quincey  from  the 
"  noticeable  man,  with  large,  gray  eyes,"  we  would  not 
intimate  that,  with  all  his  intellectual  acumen,  he  had 
not  something  far  better  than  this  metaphysic,  hair 
splitting  talent.  Though  he  absolutely  revels  in  nice 
distinctions  and  scrupulous  qualifications,  he  was  not  a 
dry  Duns  Scotus,  a  juiceless  Thomas  Aquinas.  While 
his  logic  cut  like  a  razor,  his  imagination  burned  like  a 
furnace.  Though  he  had  a  schoolman's  passion  for  logical 
forms,  and  could  have  beaten  the  enemies  of  Reuchlin  at 
their  own  weapons,  his  rhetorical  aptitudes  were  profound 
and  varied,  and  his  speculative  imagination  was  little  less 
than  wonderful  in  its  range  and  power. 

De  Quincey's  humor  is  of  a  kind  which  is  not  easy  to 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCE Y.  45 

characterize.  Like  everything  belonging  to  him,  it  is  odd, 
unique,  as  original  as  his  genius.  Always  playful  and 
stingless,  it  takes  at  one  time  the  form  of  banter,  at 
another  of  mock  dignity.  Now  it  speaks  with  admiration, 
or  with  a  dry,  business  tone  of  things  usually  regarded 
with  indignation  or  horror;  now  it  mocks  at  gravity, 
cracks  jests  upon  venerable  persons  or  institutions,  quizzes 
the  owls  of  society,  and  pulls  the  beards  of  dignitaries. 
At  one  hour  it  greets  us  in  the  grave  robe  of  the  critic, 
and  pokes  fun  at  the  learned;  at  another,  in  the  scarlet 
dress  of  the  satirist,  and  blasts  hypocrisy  with  its  ridi 
cule;  and  again  it  comes  to  us  in  motley,  with  cap  and 
bells,  and  reminds  us  of  Touchstone's  wise  fooling  and 
the  mingled  pathos  and  bitterness  of  the  poor  fool  in  Lear. 
One  of  the  commonest  forms  of  DeQuincey's  playfulness 
is  exaggeration, —  the  expenditure  of  pages  of  the  gravest 
and  most  elaborate  ratiocination  upon  a  trifle, —  the  devo 
tion  of  a  senior  wrangler's  analytic  powers  to  the  dissec 
tion  of  the  merest  crotchet;  reminding  one  in  this,  it  has 
been  well  said,  of  a  great  musical  composer,  who  seats 
himself  before  a  stately  organ,  and  choosing  as  his  theme 
some  street  song,  "0  dear,  what  can  the  matter  be?"  or 
"  Polly,  put  the  kettle  on,"  pursues  it  through  figures  of 
surpassing  pomp  and  orchestral  tumult, —  glorifying  it 
into  intricate  harmonies,  and  transfiguring  its  original 
meanness  into  bewildering  bravura  and  interminable  fan 
tasia.  The  following  passage  from  "  The  English  Mail 
Coach,"  while  it  illustrates  in  some  degree  De  Quincey's 
peculiar  humor,  interveined,  as  it  often  is,  with  grave 
remark,  is  also  a  fine  specimen  of  his  measured  and  stately 
style : 

"The  modern  modes  of  traveling  cannot  compare  with  the  mail-coach 
system  in  grandeur  and  power.    They  boast  of  more  velocity,  but  not,  how- 


46  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

ever,  as  a  consciousness,  but  as  a  fact  of  our  lifeless  knowledge,  resting  upon 
alien  evidence;  as,  for  instance,  because  somebody  says  that  we  have  gone 
fifty  miles  in  the  hour,  or  upon  the  evidence  of  a  result,  as  that  actually  we 
find  ourselves  in  York  four  hours  after  leaving  London.  Apart  from  such  an 
assertion,  or  such  a  result,  I  am  little  aware  of  the  pace.  But,  seated  on 
the  old  mail-coach,  we  needed  no  evidence  out  of  ourselves  to  indicate  the 
velocity.  On  this  system  the  word  was— Non  magna  loquimur,  as  upon 
railways,  but  magna  mmmus.  The  vital  experience  of  the  glad  animal  sen 
sibilities  made  doubts  impossible  on  the  question  of  our  speed;  we  heard 
our  speed,  we  saw  it,  we  felt  it  as  a  thrilling;  and  this  speed  was  not  the 
product  of  blind  insensate  agencies,  that  had  no  sympathy  to  give,  but  was 
incarnated  in  the  fiery  eyeballs  of  an  animal,  in  his  dilated  nostril,  spasmodic 
muscles,  and  echoing  hoofs.  This  speed  was  incarnated  in  the  visible  conta 
gion  amongst  brutes  of  some  impulse,  that,  radiating  into  their  natures,  had 
yet  its  centre  and  beginning  in  man.  The  sensibility  of  the  horse,  uttering 
itself  in  the  maniac  light  of  his  eye,  might  be  the  last  vibration  of  such  a 
movement;  the  glory  of  Salamanca  might  be  the  first,— but  the  intervening 
link  that  connected  them,  that  spread  the  earthquake  of  the  battle  into  the 
eyeball  of  the  horse,  was  the  heart  of  man,— kindling  in  the  rapture  of  the 
fiery  strife,  and  then  propagating  its  own  tumults  by  motions,  and  gestures 
to  the  sympathies,  more  or  less  dim,  in  his  servant,  the  horse 

"Bat  now,  on  the  new  system  of  traveling,  iron  tubes  and  boilers  have 
disconnected  man's  heart  from  the  ministers  of  his  locomotion.  Nile  nor 
Trafalgar  has  power  any  more  to  raise  an  extra  bubble  in  a  steam  kettle. 
The  galvanic  cycle  is  broken  up  for  ever:  man's  imperial  nature  no  longer 
sends  itself  forward  through  the  electric  sensibility  of  the  horse;  interagen- 
cies  are  gone  in  the  mode  of  communication  between  the  horse  and  his  master, 
out  of  which  grew  so  many  aspects  of  sublimity  under  accidents  of  mists 
that  hid,  or  sudden  blazes  that  revealed,  of  mobs  that  agitated,  or  midnight 
solitudes  that  awed.  Tidings,  fitted  to  convulse  all  nations,  must  hencefor- 
wards  travel  by  culinary  process ;  and  the  trumpet  that  once  announced  from 
afar  the  laurelled  mail,  heart-shaking,  when  heard  screaming  on  the  wind, 
and  advancing  through  the  darkness  to  every  village  or  solitary  house  on  its 
route,  has  now  given  way  for  ever  to  the  pot-wallopings  of  the  boiler." 

The  crowning  achievement  of  De  Quincey  in  this  depart 
ment  is  his  "  Murder  considered  as  one  of  the  Fine  Arts," 
which  all  will  admit  to  be  a  masterpiece  of  cynicism,  with 
out  a  parallel  in  our  literature.  The  principle  on  which 
this  paper  is  based,  is  that  everything  is  to  be  judged, 
in  an  aesthetic  point  of  view,  by  the  end  it  professes  to 
accomplish,  and  is  to  be  considered  good  or  bad, — that  is, 
for  its  own  purposes, —  according  to  the  degree  in  which 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  47 

it  accomplishes  that  end.  As  Aristotle  would  say,  "  The 
virtue  of  a  thing  is  to  be  judged  by  its  end."  For  ex 
ample,  dirt,  according  to  Lord  Palmerston's  famous  defini 
tion,  is  only  "  matter  in  the  wrong  place."  Put  it  at  the 
bottom  of  a  fruit-tree,  and  so  far  is  it  from  being  a  nui 
sance,  that  the  dirtier  it  is  the  better.  So  with  murder; 
leave  out  of  view  the  ultimate  purpose  of  the  thing,  and 
take  it  simply  on  its  own  merits,  and  the  more  murder 
ous  it  is,  the  more  does  it  come  up  to  its  fundamental 
idea.  It  follows  that  there  are  clever,  brilliant,  even  ideal 
murders,  and  that  they  may  be  criticised  by  dilettanti 
and  amateurs,  like  a  painting,  or  statue,  or  other  work 
of  art.  In  a  similar  spirit  De  Quincey  claims  that  a  proper 
proportion  of  rogues  is  essential  to  the  proper  mounting 
of  a  metropolis, —  that  is,  the  idea  is  not  complete  without 
them. 

What  can  be  more  exquisite  than  the  fooling  in  the 
following  passage:  "Believe  me,  it  is  not  necessary  to  a 
man's  respectability  that  he  should  commit  a  murder. 
Many  a  man  has  passed  through  life  most  respectably, 
without  attempting  any  species  of  homicide,  good,  bad, 
or  indifferent.  It  is  your  first  duty  to  ask  yourself,  quid 
valeant  humeri,  quid  ferre  recusent?  —  we  cannot  all  be 
brilliant  men  in  this  life.  ...  A  man  came  to  me  as 
the  candidate  for  the  place  of  my  servant,  just  then  va 
cant.  He  had  the  reputation  of  having  dabbled  a  little 
in  our  art,  some  said,  not  without  merit.  What  startled 
me,  however,  was,  that  he  supposed  this  art  to  be  part 
of  the  regular  duties  in  my  service.  Now  that  was  a  thing 
I  would  not  allow ;  so  I  said  at  once :  '  If  once  a  man 
indulges  himself  in  murder,  very  soon  he  comes  to  think 
little  of  robbing;  and  from  robbing  he  comes  next  to 


48  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

drinking  and  Sabbath-breaking,  and  from  that  to  incivility 
and  procrastination.  Once  begin  upon  this  downward  path, 
you  never  know  where  you  are  to  stop.  Many  a  man 
has  dated  his  ruin  from  some  murder  or  other  that  per 
haps  he  thought  little  of  at  the  time.  Principiis  obsta, — 
that's  my  rule." 

Of  pathos,  we  need  only  cite  "  The  Confessions,"  "  The 
Vision  of  a  Sudden  Death,"  "  Joan  of  Arc,"  and  "  The 
Household  Wreck,"  to  show  that  De  Quincey  was  a  con 
summate  master.  The  fine  paper  on  "  The  English  Mail 
Coach,"  of  which  we  have  already  spoken,  has  several 
passages  which  show  that  he  had  an  ear  delicately  at 
tuned  to 

41  The  still  ead  music  of  humanity," 

—  one  of  which  we  cannot  forbear  quoting.  After  stating 
that  "  the  mail-coaches  it  was  that  distributed  over  the 
face  of  the  land,  like  the  opening  of  apocalyptic  vials, 
the  heart-shaking  news  of  Trafalgar,  of  Salamanca,  of 
Vittoria,  of  Waterloo,"  he  proceeds  to  describe  a  ride  to 
London  in  a  coach  that  bore  the  tidings  of  a  great  vic 
tory  in  Spain.  At  one  village  where  the  coach  stopped, 
a  poor  woman,  seeing  De  Quincey  with  a  newspaper  in 
his  hand,  came  to  him.  She  had  a  son  there  in  the  23d 
Dragoons.  "My  heart  sank  within  me  as  she  made  that 
answer."  This  regiment,  originally  three  hundred  and 
fifty  strong,  had  made  a  sublime  charge  that  day,  par 
alyzing  a  French  column  six  thousand  strong,  and  had 
come  back  one  in  four!  De  Quincey  told  her  all  that  he 
had  the  heart  to  tell  her  of  that  dearly  bought  victory, 
but  — 

"I  told  her  not  of  the  bloody  price  that  had  been  paid.  I  showed  her 
not  the  funeral  banners  under  which  the  noble  regiment  lay  sleeping.  But 
I  told  her  how  those  dear  children  of  England,  officers  and  privates,  had 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  49 

leaped  their  horses  over  all  obstacles  as  gayly  as  hunters  to  the  morning's 
chase.  I  told  her  how  they  rode  their  horses  into  the  mists  of  death,  (say 
ing  to  myself,  but  not  saying  to  her)  and  laid  down  their  young  lives  for 
thee,  O  mother  England!  as  willingly,— poured  out  their  noble  blood  as 
cheerfully, —  as  ever,  after  a  long  day's  sport,  when  infants,  they  had  rested 
their  heads  upon  their  mother's  knees,  or  sunk  to  sleep  in  her  arms.  Strange 
as  it  is,  she  seemed  to  have  no  fear  of  her  son's  safety.  Fear  was  swallowed 
up  in  joy  so  absolutely  that  in  the  mere  simplicity  of  her  fervent  nature,  the 
poor  woman  threw  her  arms  round  my  neck,  as  she  thought  of  her  son,  and 
gave  to  me  the  kiss  which  was  secretly  meant  for  him." 

De  Quincey  is  not  only  a  great  master  of  pathos,  but  his 
genius  for  the  sublime  is  equally  manifest;  it  would  be 
hard  to  name  a  modern  English  writer  who  had  a  mind 
more  sensitive  to  emotions  of  grandeur.  One  of  the  most 
striking  peculiarities  of  his  sensuous  framework,  was  his 
exquisite  sensibility  to  the  luxuries  and  grandeurs  of  sound. 
Keenly  alive  to  the  pomps  and  glories  of  the  eye,  it  was 
through  the  ear  that  he  drank  in  the  highest  intoxications 
of  sense;  and  to  obtain  "  a  grand  debauch"  of  that  nature, 
there  was  hardly  any  sacrifice  that  he  was  not  willing  to 
make.  We  are  not  surprised,  therefore,  to  find  that  his 
style  is  preeminently  musical,  and  that  from  music  he 
draws  many  of  his  aptest  and  most  impressive  metaphors. 

De  Quincey's  dialectic  skill  and  ability  in  handling  prac 
tical  themes  are  shown  in  his  "  Logic  of  Political  Economy," 
a  work  in  which  he  defends  and  illustrates  the  doctrines  of 
Ricardo,  and  which  drew  forth  the  praise  of  J.  S.  Mill.  In 
speaking  of  his  motives  for  writing  this  treatise,  he  says  of 
certain  others  on  the  same  subject:  "  I  saw  that  these  were 
generally  the  very  dregs  and  rinsings  of  the  human  intel 
lect;  and  that  any  man  of  sound  head,  and  practised  in 
wielding  logic  with  a  scholastic  adroitness,  might  take  up 
the  whole  academy  of  modern  economists,  and  throttle  them 
between  heaven  and  earth  with  his  finger  and  thumb,  or 
bray  their  fungous  heads  to  powder  with  a  lady's  fan." 
3 


50  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

The  great,  crowning  glory  of  DeQuincey  is  his  style, 
upon  which  he  bestowed  incredible  labor, —  rewriting  some 
pages  of  the  "  Confessions,"  as  he  told  a  friend  of  ours,  not 
less  than  sixty  times.  His  style  is  an  almost  perfect  vehicle 
of  his  ideas, —  accommodating  itself,  as  it  does,  with  mar 
vellous  flexibility,  to  the  highest  nights  of  imagination,  to 
the  minutest  subtleties  of  reasoning,  and  to  the  wildest 
freaks  of  humor, —  in  short,  to  all  the  exigencies  of  his 
thought.  In  his  hands  our  stiff  Saxon  language  becomes 
almost  as  ductile  as  the  Greek.  Ideas  that  seem  to  defy 
expression, —  ideas  so  subtle,  or  so  vague  and  elusive,  that 
most  thinkers  find  it  difficult  to  contemplate  them  at  all, — 
are  conveyed  on  his  page  with  a  nicety,  a  felicity  of  phrase, 
that  might  almost  provoke  the  envy  of  Shakespeare.  It  is 
the  most  passionately  eloquent,  the  most  thoroughly  poetical 
prose,  our  language  has  produced,  the  organ-like  variety 
and  grandeur  of  its  cadence  affecting  the  mind  as  only  per 
fect  verse  affects  it.  Grave,  stately,  and  sustained,  when 
expressing  solemn  and  imperial  thoughts, —  light  and  care 
lessly  graceful  when  playing  with  the  theme,  it  is  at  once 
sharp  and  sweet,  flowing  and  pithy,  condensed  and  expan 
sive  ;  now  expressing  chapters  in  a  sentence,  now  amplifying 
a  single  thought  into  pages  of  rich,  glowing,  and  delightful 
eloquence.  Even  Milton,  in  his  best  prose,  is  not  a  greater 
master  of  melody  and  harmony;  and  in  some  of  the  grandest 
passages,  where  the  thought  and  feeling  go  on  swelling  and 
deepening  from  the  first  note  to  the  last  in  a  lofty  climax, 
the  language  of  De  Quincey  can  be  compared  only  to  the 
swell  and  crash  of  an  orchestra. 

It  is  true  his  style  bristles  with  scholasticisms;  but  how 
they  tell!  You  feel,  as  you  read,  that  here  is  a  man  who 
has  gauged  the  potentiality  of  every  word  he  uses;  who  has 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  51 

analyzed  the  simples  of  all  his  compound  phrases.  The 
chief  characteristic  of  his  style  is  elaborate  stateliness;  his 
principal  figure,  personification.  Generally  his  sentences 
are  long;  the  very  opposite  of  those  asthmatic  and  short- 
winded  ones  which  he  pronounces  a  defect  in  French 
writers;  and  they  are  as  full  of  life  and  joints  as  a  serpent. 
It  was  said  of  Coleridge  that  no  stenographer  could  do 
justice  to  his  lectures,  because,  though  he  spoke  deliber 
ately,  yet  it  was  impossible,  from  the  first  part  of  his 
sentences,  even  to  guess  how  they  would  end.  Each  clause 
was  a  new  surprise,  and  the  close  often  as  unexpected  as  a 
thunderbolt.  So  with  the  Opium-Eater;  "the  great  Pla 
tonic  year,"  as  Hazlitt  says  of  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  "re 
volves  in  one  of  his  periods ; "  or,  as  De  Quincey  himself 
says  of  Bishop  Berkeley,  "  he  passes  with  the  utmost  ease 
and  speed  from  tar-water  to  the  Trinity,  from  a  moleheap 
to  the  thrones  of  the  Godhead."  Of  all  the  great  writers, 
he  is  one  of  the  easiest  we  know  of  to  read  aloud.  So  perfect 
is  the  construction  of  his  sentences, —  so  exquisitely  articu 
lated  are  all  their  vertebrae  and  joints, —  so  musical  are  his 
longest  periods,  even  when  they  accomplish  a  cometary 
sweep  ere  he  closes,  that  the  most  villainous  elocutionist, 
in  reading  them,  cannot  help  laying  the  emphases  in  the 
right  place. 

And  yet,  with  all  these  wondrous  gifts  as  a  writer,  De 
Quincey  has  one  glaring  defect,  which  neutralizes  in  a  great 
degree  the  force  of  his  splendid  genius, —  frustrates  all  ade 
quate  success.  Among  the  fairies  who  dropped  gifts  into  his 
cradle,  there  was  one  whose  gift  was  a  curse.  She  gave  him 
Irresolution, —  the  want  of  coordinating  power,  of  central 
control,  of  intellectual  volition.  It  is  for  this  reason  that 
De  Quincey,  with  all  his  transcendent  abilities  and  immense 


52  THOMAS   DE  QUIKCEY. 

learning,  has  no  commanding  position  in  English  literature, 
—  exerts  little  influence  on  his  age, —  is  the  centre  of  no 
circle.  Unhappily  this  weakness  of  will  was  still  further 
aggravated  by  opium;  and  of  the  Opium-Eater  he  himself 
tells  us,  half  sportively,  but  too  truly,  that  it  is  a  character 
istic  never  to  finish  anything.  To  these  two  causes  may  be 
ascribed  the  abiding  deficiency  of  his  writings, —  the  fact 
that,  with  all  his  genius  and  learning,  he  exerts  less  positive 
influence  than  many  a  man  with  a  tithe  of  his  ability.  To 
foreigners  he  is  hardly  known.  The  one  melancholy  reflec 
tion  which  his  writings  suggest  is  that  they  are  all  pro- 
vokingly  fragmentary;  he  has  produced  not  one  complete 
and  connected  whole.  As  his  power  of  conception  is  logical 
rather  than  creative,  he  analyzes  wonderfully,  but  com 
pounds  imperfectly, —  is  a  philosopher  rather  than  a  poet. 
Tantalus-like,  he  stands  up  to  the  chin  in  learning,  but  is 
unable,  save  by  a  desperate  effort  of  the  will,  to  lure  it  to 
the  lip.  Over  his  head  hang  golden  fruits,  but  only  the 
most  convulsive,  dexterous  grasp  rescues  them  from  those 
gales  of  nervous  distraction  which  would  scatter  them  to 
the  four  winds.  Hence  his  writings,  with  all  their  marvel 
lous  subtlety  and  exquisite  beauty,  are  chaotic  and  indeter 
minate, —  tend  to  no  fixed  goal, —  are  as  purposeless  as 
dreams.  They  are  reveries,  outpourings,  improvisations, — 
not  works.  He  modulates  and  weaves  together  fragments 
of  divinest  song;  but  gives  us  no  symphony.  Gleams  come 
upon  his  page  from  deep  central  fires;  lights  flash  across  it 
from  distant  horizons;  but  the  light  is  that  of  a  dancing 
will-o'-the-wisp,  not  the  steady  throbbing  of  a  star  by 
which  men  may  shape  their  course.  As  Carlyle  says  of 
John  Stirling's  conversation,  De  Quincey's  writings  are 
"  beautifullest  sheet-lightning,  not  to  be  condensed  into 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  53 

thunderbolts."  Hence  it  is  that  he  has  charmed,  delighted, 
astonished  his  age,  but  failed  to  impress  it. 

De  Quincey  himself  appears  sensible  of  this  vagrancy, 
this  peripatetic  instinct  of  his  mind,  and  calls  it  an  inter 
mitting  necessity,  affecting  his  particular  system  like  that 
of  moulting  in  birds,  or  that  of  migration  which  affects 
swallows.  "  Nobody,1'  says  he,  "  is  angry  with  swallows 
for  vagabondizing  periodically,  and  surely  I  have  a  better 
right  to  indulge  therein  than  a  swallow;  I  take  precedency 
of  a  swallow  in  any  company  whatever."  Who,  after  this 
naive  and  ingenious  "  confession  and  avoidance,"  can  have 
the  heart  to  complain?  Prim  folks,  who  cling  to  the 
dramatic  unities,  and  all  that,  and  who  are  shocked  by  a 
style  that  deviates  from  the  reproachless  routine  of  Hugh 
Blair,  D.D.,  will,  no  doubt,  continue  to  be  scandalized  by 
this  dreamer.  But  those  who  have  drunk  inspiration 
from  Richter  and  deep  draughts  of  wisdom  from  Montaigne, 
will  forgive  De  Quincey,  too,  his  vagrancy,  for  the  sake 
of  its  erratic  pleasantness.  As  Menzel  says  of  the  German 
rambler:  "We  would  willingly  pardon  every  one  his 
mannerism,  if  he  were  but  a  Jean  Paul;  and  a  fault  of 
richness  is  always  better  than  one  of  poverty," — so  we 
may  say  of  the  English.  Who  would  have  thought  to 
"  pull  up  "  Samuel  Taylor  Coleridge  in  one  of  his  infinitely 
parenthetical  monologues,  because  he  diverged  from  the 
grand  trunk  line,  and  hurried  you  into  insulated  recesses 
and  sequestered  Edens  unnoted  in  the  way  bill?  No  man, 
surely,  but  a  grim  utilitarian,  reduced  to  the  very  lowest 
denomination. 

This  very  discursiveness  and  libertinism  of  intellect, — 
this  tendency  to  wander  from  the  main  channel  of  his 
thought, —  to  steer  toward  every  port  but  that  set  down 


54  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

in  the  bill  of  lading, —  lent,  it  must  be  confessed, —  an 
indescribable  charm  to  De  Quincey's  conversation  as  it 
welled  out  from  those  capacious,  overflowing  cells  of 
thought  and  memory,  which  a  single  word,  or  hint,  or 
token  could  agitate.  Gilfillan  has  finely  described  his 
small,  thin,  piercing  voice,  winding  out  so  distinctly  his 
subtleties  of  thought  and  feeling, —  his  long  and  strange 
sentences  evolving  like  a  piece  of  complicated  music;  and 
the  Ettrick  Shepherd,  in  the  "  Noctes,"  addresses  him  as  one 
having  the  "  voice  of  a  nicht-wanderin'  man,  laigh  and 
lone,  pitched  on  the  key  o'  a  wimblin'  burn  speakin'  to 
itsel'  in  the  silence,  aneath  the  moon  and  stars."  A 
gentleman  who  visited  De  Quincey  in  1854,  thus  records 
his  impressions  of  him,  after  a  half  hour's  conversation: 
"  We  have  listened  to  Sir  William  Hamilton  at  his  own 
fireside,  to  Carlyle  walking  in  the  parks  of  London,  to 
Lamartine  in  the  midst  of  a  favored  few  at  his  own  house, 
to  Cousin  at  the  Sorbonne,  and  to  many  others;  but  never 
have  we  heard  such  sweet  music  of  eloquent  speech  as 
then  flowed  from  De  Quincey's  tongue.  Strange  light 
beamed  from  that  grief-worn  face,  and  for  a  little  while 
that  weak  body,  so  long  fed  upon  by  pain,  seemed  to  be 
clothed  upon  with  supernatural  youth." 

Eloquent  as  De  Quincey  was,  his  conversational  powers 
were  at  their  full  height  only  when  he  was  under  the 
influence  of  his  favorite  drug.  The  best  time  to  hear 
the  lion  roar  was  at  four  or  five  o'clock  in  the  morning; 
then,  when  recovering  from  the  stupor  into  which  the  opium 
had  plunged  him,  his  tongue  seemed  touched  with  an 
eloquence  almost  divine.  It  mattered  little  what  was  the 
theme  of  his  high  argument;  whether  beeves  or  butter 
flies,  St.  Basil  or  ^Eschylus;  upon  the  grandest  or  the 


THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY.  55 

most  trivial,  he  would  descant  in  the  same  lenem  susur- 
rum, —  never  losing  a  certain  mellow  earnestness,  yet 
never  rising  into  declamation, —  in  sentences  exquisitely 
jointed,  and  with  the  enthusiasm  of  a  mystic,  the  subtlety 
of  a  schoolman,  and  the  diction  of  a  poet.  It  is  a  curious 
fact  that,  though  he  was  the  soul  of  courtesy,  he  never 
for  a  moment  thought  of  adapting  his  language  to  the 
understanding  of  his  listener.  The  most  illiterate  porter, 
housemaid,  or  even  prowling  beggar,  he  would  address  on 
the  most  trivial  themes,  with  as  much  pomp  of  rhetoric, 
in  language  as  precise  and  measured,  and  abounding  in 
as  many  "long-tailed  words  in  osity  and  ation" — as  that 
in  which  he  would  have  addressed  an  Oxford  professor  on 
a  vexed  point  in  metaphysics,  or  Porson  on  a  classical 
emendation.  Mrs.  Gordon,  in  her  life  of  Professor  Wilson, 
has  given  a  specimen  of  the  style  in  which  the  Opium- 
Eater  was  wont  to  address  her  father's  housekeeper, 
when  directing  her  how  to  prepare  his  food;  and  did  it 
come  from  a  less  trustworthy  source,  we  should  take  the 
order  as  a  burlesque  or  caricature.  Wishing  his  meat 
cut  with  the  grain,  he  would  say:  "Owing  to  dyspepsia 
afflicting  my  system,  and  the  possibility  of  any  additional 
derangement  of  the  stomach  taking  place,  consequences 
incalculably  distressing  would  arise, —  so  much  so,  indeed, 
as  to  increase  nervous  irritation,  and  prevent  me  from 
attending  to  matters  of  overwhelming  importance, —  if  you 
do  not  remember  to  cut  the  mutton  in  a  diagonal,  rather 
than  in  a  longitudinal  form."  No  wonder  that  the  cook, — 
a  simple  Scotchwoman, —  stood  aghast,  exclaiming:  "  Weel, 
I  never  heard  the  like  o'  that  in  a'  my  days;  the  body 
has  an  awfu'  sicht  o1  -words.  If  it  had  been  my  ain 
master  that  was  wanting  his  dinner,  he  would  ha'  ordered 


56  THOMAS   DE  QUINCEY. 

a  hale  table-fu'  wi'  little  mair  than  a  waff  o'  his  haun, 
and  here's  a'  this  claver  aboot  a  bit  o'  mutton  nae  bigger 
than  a  prin.  Mr.  De  Quinshey  would  make  a  gran1 
preacher, —  though  I'm  thinkin'  a  hantle  o'  the  folks 
wouldna  ken  what  he  was  drivin'  at."* 

Doubtless  the  description  of  Praed's  vicar,  applied  to 
DeQuincey,  would  be  no  exaggeration: 

"  His  talk  is  like  a  stream  which  runs 

With  rapid  change  from  rocks  to  roses; 
It  slips  from  politics  to  puns, 

It  glides  from  Mahomet  to  Moses; 
Beginning  with  the  laws  which  keep 

The  planets  in  their  radiant  courses, 
And  ending  with  some  precept  deep 

For  skinning  eels,  or  shoeing  horses." 

In  conclusion,  we  would  urge  those  of  our  readers, 
especially  our  young  readers,  who  are  strangers  to  the 
Opium-Eater's  twenty-four  volumes,  to  read  them  at 
their  earliest  opportunity.  If  they  would  make  the 
acquaintance  of  one  of  the  greatest  scholars  and  thinkers 
of  our  century, —  of  a  piercing  and  imperial  intellect, 
which,  in  all  the  great  faculties  of  analysis,  combination, 
and  reception,  has  had  few  superiors  in  modern  times, — 
of  one  of  the  subtlest  yet  most  sympathetic  critics  our 
literature  can  boast,  whether  of  art,  nature,  literature,  or 
life, — of  a  writer  who,  in  an  age  of  scoffing  and  skepti 
cism,  has  never  sown  the  seeds  of  doubt  in  any  human 
heart, —  of  a  writer  who,  by  the  magnetism  of  his  genius, 
the  affluence  of  his  knowledge,  his  logical  acumen,  his 
imaginative  wealth,  his  marvellous  word-painting,  gives 
a  charm  to  every  theme  he  touches; — above  all,  if  they 

*  The  account  here  given  of  De  Quincey'a  conversation  is  necessarily  a 
repetition,  with  some  changes,  of  that  given  in  the  author's  former  book, 
"  The  Great  Conversers,  and  Other  Essays." 


THOMAS    DE  QUINCEY.  57 

would  know  the  might  and  majesty,  the  pomp,  the  deli 
cacy,  and  the  beauty  of  our  noble  English  tongue  when 
its  winged  words  are  commanded  by  a  master, —  we  would 
conjure  them  to  study  the  writings  of  De  Quincey. 
Though  he  has  left  no  great  single  work  to  which  we 
can  point  as  a  monument  of  his  genius,  and  his  most 
precious  ideas  are  in  the  condition  of  the  Sibyl's  leaves 
after  they  had  been  scattered  by  the  wind,  we  may, 
nevertheless,  say  in  the  words  of  an  English  reviewer, 
"that  the  exquisite  finish  of  his  style,  with  the  scholastic 
rigor  of  his  logic,  form  a  combination  which  centuries 
may  never  reproduce,  but  which  every  generation  should 
study,  as  one  of  the  marvels  of  English  literature." 


ROBERT  SOUTH. 


person  who  is  wont  to  slake  his  intellectual  thirst 
at  "the  wells  of  English  undefiled,"  will  soon  for 
get  the  tingling  delight,  the  exhilaration  of  mind  and 
spirit,  with  which  he  first  read  the  sermons  of  Robert 
South,  the  shrewdest,  most  caustic,  most  fiery,  and,  with 
the  exception  of  Thomas  Fuller,  the  wittiest  of  the  old 
English  divines.  Among  the  giants  of  English  theology 
he  stands  alone.  Intellectually  and  morally,  his  individ 
uality  was  strongly  marked.  To  neither  Hooker  nor  Bar 
row, —  to  neithei  Taylor  nor  Tillotson, —  nor,  indeed,  to 
any  one  of  his  great  contemporaries,  except  in  intellectual 
might,  can  we  compare  him.  Nature  seems  to  have  framed 
but  one  such,  and  then  broken  the  mould.  He  was  a 
kind  of  Tory  Sydney  Smith,  yet  lacking  the  genial,  sunny 
disposition,  and  the  humor,  of  that  divine  wit  and  witty 
divine;  and  in  reading  his  works,  it  is  difficult  to  say 
which  is  most  to  be  admired,  the  thorough  grasp  and 
exhaustive  treatment  of  the  subject,  the  masterly  arrange 
ment  of  the  "thoughts,  or  the  vitality,  energy  and  freshness 
of  expression,  which  have  given  his  sermons  a  higher  place 
in  the  library  of  the  scholar  than  even  in  that  of  the 
theologian  or  the  pulpit  orator. 

Robert  South  was  the  son  of  an  eminent  London  mer 
chant,  and  was  born  in  1633.  In  1647  he  was  admitted 
a  king's  scholar  at  Westminster,  under  the  tuition  of  the 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  59 

celebrated  Dr.  Busby,  and,  while  there,  gave  indications 
of  that  out-and-out  Toryism  for  which  he  was  conspicu 
ous  through  life  by  praying  for  Charles  I,  by  name,  while 
reading  the  Latin  prayers  in  school  on  the  day  of  that 
monarch's  execution.  In  1651  he  entered  Christ  Church, 
Oxford,  at  the  same  time  with  John  Locke, —  the  future 
champion  of  the  divine  right  of  kings  in  company  with 
the  future  champion  of  freedom.  At  college,  he  was  a 
zealous  student,  indefatigable  in  his  efforts  to  prepare 
himself  for  the  gladiatorial  contests  in  which  he  was  to 
measure  swords  with  some  of  the  most  adroit  masters  of 
theological  fence  of  the  time.  He  graduated  in  1655, 
and  only  eight  years  after  had  so  distinguished  himself 
by  his  learning  and  eloquence,  that  he  obtained  the  de 
gree  of  Doctor  of  Divinity.  In  1660  he  was  elected  public 
orator  to  the  University,  and  preached  before  the  king's 
commissioners  his  celebrated  discourse  entitled  "  The  Scribe 
Instructed,1'  the  object  of  which  is  to  show  what  are  the 
qualifications  of  the  Christian  preacher,  and  the  absurdity 
and  wickedness  involved  in  becoming  a  preacher  of  God's 
word  without  sufficient  ability,  knowledge  and  preparation. 
Though  preached  at  the  early  age  of  twenty-seven,  this 
sermon  is  one  of  his  most  original  and  vigorous  produc 
tions,  and  is  characterized  throughout  by  that  logical 
arrangement,  strength  of  thought,  and  freshness  and  epi 
grammatic  pungency  of  style,  which  distinguish  all  of  his 
best  discourses.  The  intensity  of  thought  and  feeling  which 
burns  through  this  discourse  must  have  stamped  South, 
in  the  minds  of  all  who  heard  him,  as  a  preacher  of  the 
highest  ability, —  as  a  spirit  "of  the  greatest  size,  and  the 
divinest  mettle." 

After  speaking  of  the  natural  abilities  of  the  preacher, 


60  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

he  proceeds  to  show  the  importance  of  perfecting  them 
by  study,  exercise,  and  due  improvement  of  the  same, 
and  says:  "A  well  radicated  habit,  in  a  lively,  vegete 
faculty,  is  like  '  an  apple  of  gold  in  a  picture  of  silver.' 
...  It  is  not  enough  to  have  books,  or  for  a  man  to 
have  his  divinity  in  his  pocket,  or  upon  the  shelf;  but 
he  must  have  mastered  his  notions,  till  they  even  incor 
porate  into  his  mind,  so  as  to  be  able  to  produce  and 
wield  them  upon  all  occasions;  and  not,  when  a  difficulty 
is  proposed  and  a  performance  enjoined,  to  say  that  he 
will  consult  such  and  such  authors:  for  this  is  not  to  be 
a  divine,  who  is  rather  to  be  a  walking  library  than  a 
walking  index.  ...  It  is  not  the  oil  in  the  wick,  but 
in  the  vessel,  which  must  feed  the  lamp.  The  former  may 
indeed  cause  a  present  blaze,  but  it  is  the  latter  which 
must  give  it  a  lasting  light.  It  is  not  the  spending  money 
a  man  has  in  his  pocket,  but  his  hoards  in  the  chest,  or 
in  the  bank,  which  must  make  him  rich.  A  dying  man 
has  his  breath  in  his  nostrils,  but  to  have  it  in  the  lungs 
is  that  which  must  preserve  life."  Of  quacks  and  moun 
tebanks  in  divinity  he  proclaims  himself  the  mortal  foe, 
declaring  that  when  Christ  says  that  a  scribe  must  be 
stocked  with  "things  new  and  old,"  he  does  not  mean 
"that  he  should  have  a  hoard  of  old  sermons,  with  a 
bundle  of  new  opinions,"  and  as  for  "such  mushroom 
divines  generally,  who  start  up  so  of  a  sudden,  we  do 
not  find  their  success  so  good  as  to  recommend  their 
practice.  Hasty  births  are  seldom  long-lived,  but  never 
strong."  He  has  a  sharp  thrust  at  a  class  of  preachers 
not  altogether  extinct  in  our  own  day,  who  so  pray  that 
they  "do  not  supplicate,  but  compliment  Almighty  God;" 
and  he  ridicules  others  who  "  lie  grovelling  on  the  ground 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  61 

with  a  dead  and  contemptible  flatness,"  passing  off  "  dull 
ness  as  a  mark  of  regeneration." 

Passages  of  this  sermon  rise  to  a  high  pitch  of  eloquence, 
as  where  he  dwells  on  the  duty  of  the  preacher  to  em 
ploy  significant  speech  and  expression  in  enforcing  the 
truths  of  the  gospel.  God's  word  he  pronounces  a  sys 
tem  of  the  best  rhetoric,  as  well  as  a  body  of  religion; 
and  Politian,  who  says  that  he  abstained  from  reading  the 
Scriptures,  for  fear  they  would  spoil  his  style,  is  declared 
to  be  a  blockhead  as  well  as  an  atheist,  who  has  "  as  little 
gust  for  the  elegancies  of  expression  as  for  the  sacredness 
of  the  matter."  As  the  highest  things  require  the  highest 
expressions,  so,  South  says,  we  shall  find  nothing  in  Scrip 
ture  so  sublime  in  itself,  but  it  is  reached  and  sometimes 
overtopped  by  the  sublimity  of  the  expression.  The  pas 
sions,  he  asserts,  have  been  more  powerfully  described  by 
the  Hebrew  than  by  the  heathen  poets.  "  What  poetry," 
he  asks,  "  ever  paralleled  Solomon  in  his  description  of 
love,  as  to  all  the  ways,  effects,  and  ecstasies,  and  tyran 
nies  of  that  commanding  passion?  And  where  do  we  read 
such  strange  risings  and  fallings,  now  the  faintings  and 
languishings,  now  the  terrors  and  astonishments  of  despair, 
venting  themselves  in  such  high  amazing  strains,  as  in 
Ps.  Ixxvii?  Or  where  did  we  ever  find  sorrow  flowing 
forth  in  such  a  natural  prevailing  pathos,  as  in  the  lam 
entations  of  Jeremy?  One  would  think  that  every  let 
ter  was  written  with  a  tear,  every  word  was  the  noise 
of  a  breaking  heart;  that  the  author  was  a  man  compacted 
of  sorrows,  disciplined  to  grief  from  his  infancy, —  one 
who  never  breathed  but  in  sighs,  nor  spoke  but  in  a 
groan." 

In  his  boyhood,  South  was  an  admirer  of  Oliver  Crom- 


62  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

well;  but  he  early  became  an  ardent  partisan  of  the  Res 
toration, — "  the  very  bulldog,"  one  has  termed  him,  "  of 
the  civil  and  ecclesiastical  establishment."  During  the 
reign  of  William  he  rejected  all  offers  of  preferment;  he 
was  a  great  admirer  of  Archbishop  Laud,  and  execrated 
the  Toleration  Act,  being  equally  intolerant  to  indul 
gences  and  forbearances,  to  Papist  and  Puritan.  In  1663, 
he  preached  before  Charles  the  Second,  on  the  anniversary 
of  the  "murder"  of  Charles  I,  his  famous  sermon,  "Pre 
tence  of  Conscience  no  Excuse  for  Rebellion," — the  fiercest 
and  most  truculent  of  his  political  discourses.  The  whole 
vocabulary  of  scorn  is  exhausted  in  this  invective  for  terms 
in  which  to  denounce  the  enemies  of  the  late  King,  who 
was  "  causelessly  rebelled  against,"  and  "  barbarously  mur 
dered  by  the  worst  of  men  and  the  most  obliged  of  sub 
jects."  This  murder,  which  he  pronounces  the  blackest 
fact  which  the  sun  ever  saw  since  he  hid  his  face  upon 
the  crucifixion  of  our  Saviour,  was  perpetrated  by  the  scum 
of  the  nation  —  that  is,  by  what  was  then  the  uppermost 
and  basest  part  of  it.  Like  Actseon,  Charles  was  torn  by 
a  pack  of  bloodhounds.  The  difference  between  being  con 
quered  and  slain  by  another  king,  and  being  killed  by 
infamous  rebels,  is  the  difference  between  being  torn  by 
a  lion,  and  being  eat  up  by  vermin.  Ask  the  Puritans 
what  made  them  murder  their  lawful  sovereign,  rob  the 
church,  perjure  themselves,  and  extirpate  the  government, 
and  the  constant  answer  is  conscience  —  conscience  —  "still 
this  large  capacious  thing,  their  conscience,  which  is  alwaj^s 
of  a  much  larger  compass  than  their  understanding."  No 
terms  are  too  scathing  for  Charles's  enemies;  Sir  Harry 
Vane  is  contemptuously  termed  "  that  worthy  knight  who 
was  executed  on  Tower  Hill;"  and  Milton  is  "the  Latin 


EGBERT   SOUTH.  63 

advocate,  who,  like  a  blind  adder,  has  spit  so  much  venom 
on  the  King's  person  and  cause." 

We  commend  this  sermon  of  South  to  those  croakers 
who  are  always  bewailing  the  degeneracy  of  our  age,  and 
the  fierceness  of  its  religious  controversies;  who  sigh  for 
the  good  old  times  when  the  champions  of  opposite  doc 
trines  addressed  each  other  in  the  dialect  of  doves,  and 
disputed  in  bucolics.  It  is  a  common  error  to  suppose 
that  the  controversies  of  the  present  day  are  carried  on 
with  a  violence  and  bitterness  unknown  to  past  centuries, 
or,  at  least,  to  some  golden  age  to  which  no  date  is  fixed. 
The  truth  is,  controversialists,  like  poets,  have  always  been 
"  an  irritable  race  " ;  and  those  who  doubt  the  statement 
have  only  to  look  into  the  ponderous  folios  which  the 
giants  of  old  hurled  at  each  other,  when  contending  on 
the  battle-fields  of  thought.  To  go  no  further  back  than 
Gregory  Nazianzen,  we  find  him,  when  pitted  against  the 
Emperor  Julian,  hurling  the  most  acrid  anathemas,  and 
bestowing  upon  him  epithets  which  "  a  beggar,  in  his 
drink,  would  not  bestow  upon  his  callet."  Everybody 
knows  with  what  fury  Martin  Luther,  the  hero  of  Wit 
tenberg  and  Worms,  waged  war  upon  his  theological  adver 
saries, —  how  he  showered  down  upon  them  an  incessant 
flood  of  darts,-  pointed  with  cutting  wrath,  and  feathered 
with  scorn.  Of  the  Catholic  divines,  he  says:  "  The  Papists 
are  all  asses,  and  always  will  remain  asses.  Put  them  in 
whatever  sauce  you  choose,  boiled,  roasted,  baked,  fried, 
skinned,  beat,  hashed,  they  are  always  the  same  asses.1' 
Again:  "  What  a  pleasing  sight  it  would  be  to  see  the  Pope 
and  the  Cardinals  hanging  on  one  gallows,  in  exact  order, 
like  the  seals  which  dangle  from  the  bulls  of  the  Pope." 
But  even  Luther  must  yield  the  palm  for  virulence,  not 


64  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

to  say  scurrility,  to  John  Calvin.  The  latter' s  adversaries 
are  always  knaves,  lunatics,  drunkards,  assassins;  and  some 
times  bulls,  asses,  cats  and  dogs.  But  of  all  the  contro 
versialists  of  ancient  or  modern  times,  it  would  be  diffi 
cult  to  name  one  who,  with  the  same  intellectual  might, 
has  descended  to  such  low  abuse  as  Milton.  One  who  is 
conversant  with  the  old  bard  through  his  exquisite  poetry 
alone, —  whose  thoughts  of  him  are  identified  with  the 
gorgeous  imagery  of  "  Paradise  Lost,"  and  who  thinks  of 
him  as  wandering  where  the  Muses  haunt  clear  spring, 
or  sunny  grove,  smit  with  the  love  of  sacred  song, —  as 
the  blind  old  man,  equal  in  fate  and  renown  with  blind 
Thamyris  and  blind  Maeonides, —  feeding  on  thoughts  that 
voluntary  move  harmonious  numbers,  as  the  wakeful  bird 
sings  darkling,  and,  in  shadiest  covert  hid,  tunes  her 
nocturnal  note, —  can  hardly  credit  the  fact  that  he  is  the 
same  person  who,  in  his  prose  writing,  so  out-Herods 
Herod  in  blackening  and  vilifying  his  opponents.  Not 
content  with  riddling  Salmasius  with  the  "  leaden  rain 
and  iron  hail "  of  his  logic,  with  tossing  his  giant  adver 
sary  round  the  ring  on  the  horns  of  his  merciless  dilem 
mas,  he  writes  him  down  a  dunce,  in  capital  letters, 
page  after  page.  Again,  at  the  end  of  the  sublime 
prose  hymn  which  concludes  his  work,  "  Of  Reformation 
in  England,"  he  prays  that  certain  of  his  adversaries, 
"after  a  shameful  end  in  this  life,  (which  God  grant 
them,)  shall  be  thrown  down  eternally  into  the  darkest 
and  deepest  gulf  of  hell,  where,  under  the  despiteful  con 
trol,  the  trample  and  spurn,  of  all  the  other  damned, 
that  in  the  anguish  of  their  torture  shall  have  no  other 
ease  than  to  exercise  a  raving  and  bestial  tyranny  over 
them  as  their  slaves  and  negroes,  they  shall  remain  in  that 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  65 

plight  forever,  the  basest,  the  lowermost,  the  most  dejected, 
most  underfoot  and  downtrodden  vassals  of  perdition." 
Neither  South  in  his  wildest  excesses  of  invective,  nor 
probably  any  later  controversialist,  has  anything  in  his 
writing  which  approaches  to  the  awful  severity  of  this 
imprecation. 

Again,  in  the  next  century  we  find  Rowland  Hill  calling 
Charles  Wesley  "  a  designing  wolf,"  a  man  "  as  unprin 
cipled  as  a  rook,  and  as  silly  as  a  jackdaw,"  "  a  miscre 
ant  apostate,  whose  perfection  consists  in  his  perfect  hatred 
of  all  goodness  and  of  all  good  men."  We  find  Toplady 
charging  Wesley  with  "  low  serpentine  cunning,"  "  dirty 
subterfuges,"  and  "  mean,  malicious  impotence,"  which 
"  degrade  the  man  of  parts  into  a  lying  sophister,  and 
sink  a  divine  into  the  level  of  an  oyster-woman."  "  I 
'would  no  more  enter  into  a  formal  controversy  with  such 
a  scribbler,  than  I  would  contend  for  the  wall  with  a 
chimney-sweeper."  Yet  of  these  fierce  controversialists 
two  were  authors  of  hymns  which  are  sung  oftener,  per 
haps,  than  any  others  in  the  language, —  Toplady  having 
written  "Rock  of  Ages,  Cleft  for  Me";  and  "Jesus,  Lover 
of  my  Soul,"  being  the  production  of  Charles  Wesley. 

To  return  from  this  digression:  in  1662  South  preached 
his  sermon  on. "Man  Created  in  the  Image  of  God,"  which 
is  unquestionably  his  masterpiece.  In  vigor  and  weight 
of  thought,  in  comprehensive  grasp  of  the  theme,  and  in 
pregnant  brevity  of  expression,  it  has  never  been  sur 
passed  by  any  production  of  the  British  pulpit.  The 
subject  of  the  discourse  is  the  ideal  man,  whom  South 
daguerreotypes  as  he  supposes  him  to  have  been  in 
Paradise.  In  doing  this,  he  describes  what  he  terms  the 
universal  rectitude  of  all  the  faculties  of  the  soul,  the 


66  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

understanding,  the  will,  the  passions,  and  affections.  Of 
the  understanding  he  says  that  "  it  gave  the  soul  a  bright 
and  full  view  into  all  things,  and  was  not  only  a  window, 
but  was  itself  the  prospect.  Briefly,  there  is  as  much 
difference  between  the  clear  representations  of  the  under 
standing  then,  and  the  obscure  discoveries  that  it  makes 
now,  as  there  is  between  the  prospect  of  a  casement  and 
of  a  keyhole."  Again,  he  says:  "We  may  collect  the 
excellency  of  the  understanding  then,  by  the  glorious 
reminders  of  it  now,  and  guess  at  the  stateliness  of  the 
building  by  the  magnificence  of  its  ruins.  Certainly,  that 
must  needs  have  been  very  glorious,  the  decays  of  which 
are  so  admirable.  He  that  is  comely  when  old  and 
decrepid,  surely  was  very  beautiful  when  young.  An 
Aristotle  was  but  the  rubbish  of  an  Adam,  and  Athens 
but  the  rudiments  of  paradise."  Of  the  passion  of  Joy, 
he  says  that  it  was  not  that  which  now  often  usurps  the 
name.  "It  was  not  the  mere  crackling  of  thorns,  or 
sudden  blaze  of  the  spirits,  the  exultation  of  a  tickled 
fancy,  or  a  pleased  appetite.  Joy  was  then  a  masculine 
and  a  severe  thing;  the  recreation  of  the  judgment,  the 
jubilee  of  reason.  ...  It  did  not  run  out  in  voice,  or 
indecent  eruptions,  but  filled  the  soul,  as  God  does  the 
universe,  silently  and  without  noise.  It  was  refreshing, 
but  composed,  like  the  pleasantness  of  youth  tempered 
with  the  gravity  of  age,  or  the  mirth  of  a  festival  managed 
with  the  silence  of  contemplation." 

Hardly  inferior  to  the  foregoing  discourse  is  the  sermon 
on  "  The  Pleasantness  of  Wisdom's  Ways,"  which  has  many 
of  those  pithy,  epigrammatic  sayings,  in  which  all  of 
South's  writings  abound.  "When  reason,"  he  says,  "by 
the  assistance  of  grace,  has  prevailed  over  and  outgrown 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  67 

the  encroachments  of  sense,  the  delights  of  sensuality  are 
to  such  a  one  but  as  a  hobby-horse  would  be  to  a  coun 
sellor  of  state,  or  as  tasteless  as  a  bundle  of  hay  to  a 
hungry  lion."  Of  the  fickleness  and  fleeting  nature  of 
popular  applause,  he  says:  "Like  lightning,  it  only 
flashes  upon  the  face,  and  is  gone,  and  it  is  well  if  it 
does  not  hurt  the  man."  The  pleasure  of  the  religious 
man,  he  declares,  "  is  an  easy  and  a  portable  pleasure, 
such  a  one  as  he  carries  about  in  his  bosom,  without 
alarming  either  the  eye  or  the  envy  of  the  world.  A 
man  putting  all  his  pleasures  into  this  one,  is  like  a 
traveller's  putting  all  his  goods  into  one  jewel;  the  value 
is  the  same,  and  the  convenience  greater."  The  sermon 
closes  with  some  characteristic  sarcasms  upon  the  auster 
ities  of  the  Romanists:  "Pilgrimages,  going  barefoot, 
hair-shirts,  and  whips,  with  other  such  gospel  artillery, 
are  their  only  helps  to  devotion.  ...  It  seems  that, 
with  them,  a  man  sometimes  cannot  be  a  penitent,  unless 
he  also  turns  vagabond,  and  foots  it  to  Jerusalem,  or 
wanders  over  this  or  that  part  of  the  world  to  visit  the 
shrine  of  such  or  such  a  pretended  saint;  thus,  that  which 
was  Cain's  curse,  is  become  their  religion."  Of  self- 
scourging  he  concludes  that  "  if  men's  religion  lies  no 
deeper  than  their  skin,  it  is  possible  that  they  may 
scourge  themselves  into  very  great  improvements." 

In  1663  South  was  made  Prebendary  of  St.  Peter's, 
Westminster.  In  1670  he  was  installed  a  canon  of  Christ 
Church,  Oxford.  In  1678  he  preached  a  sermon  on  "  Christ's 
Promise  the  Support  of  his  Despised  Ministers,"  which  has 
some  sharp  thrusts  at  Jeremy  Taylor.  Recommending 
simplicity  of  speech,  he  says:  "There  is  a  certain  majesty 
in  plainness;  as  the  proclamation  of  a  prince  never  frisks 


68  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

it  in  tropes  or  fine  conceits,  in  numerous  and  well-turned 
periods,  but  commands  in  sober,  natural  expressions.  A 
substantial  beauty,  as  it  comes  out  of  the  hands  of 
nature,  needs  neither  paint  nor  patch;  things  never  made 
to  adorn,  but  to  cover  something  that  would  be  hid." 
He  then  cites  Paul's  mode  of  preaching,  and  says: 
"Nothing  here  of  'the  fringes  of  the  North  Star;' 
nothing  of  '  nature's  becoming  unnatural ;'  nothing  of  the 
'  down  of  angels'  wings,'  or  '  the  beautiful  locks  of  cheru- 
bims;'  no  starched  similitudes  introduced  with  a  'Thus 
have  I  seen  a  cloud  rolling  in  its  airy  mansion,'  and 
the  like.  No,  these  were  sublimities  above  the  rise  of 
the  apostolic  spirit.  For  the  Apostles,  poor  mortals, 
were  content  to  take  lower  steps,  and  to  tell  the  world 
in  plain  terms,  that  he  who  believed  should  be  saved, 
and  that  he  who  believed  not  should  be  damned.  And 
this  was  the  dialect  which  pierced  the  conscience,  and 
made  the  hearers  cry  out  '  Men  and  brethren,  what  shall 
we  do  ? '  It  tickled  not  the  ear,  but  eunk  into  the 
heart."  South's  vehement  and  fiery  spirit  had  but  little 
taste  for  "  the  process  of  smoothness  and  delight "  by 
which  the  Spenser  of  theology  would  have  lured  men 
into  heaven.  To  his  masculine  understanding  the  diffuse, 
sensuous,  and  somewhat  effeminate  over- richness  of 
Taylor's  writings  was  particularly  distasteful;  and  the 
conceits,  quaint  similes,  unexpected  analogies,  and  gaudy 
flowers  of  rhetoric,  which  he  scattered  in  thick  profusion 
throughout  sermons  on  the  grandest  and  most  solemn 
themes,  were  as  offensive  and  incongruous  as  would  be 
the  placing  of  the  frippery  fountains,  and  clipped  yews, 
and  trim  parterres  of  Versailles  among  the  glaciers  and 
precipices  of  the  Alps. 


EGBERT   SOUTH.  69 

In  1681  South  preached  before  the  king  at  Westmin 
ster  his  sermon  on  "All  Contingencies  Directed  by  God's 
Providence."  In  this  occurs  the  famous  hit  at  that  "  bank 
rupt,  beggarly  fellow,  Cromwell,"  who  is  represented  as 
"  first  entering  the  Parliament  House  with  a  threadbare, 
torn  cloak,  and  a  greasy  hat,  and  perhaps  neither  of 
them  paid  for,'1 — a  gibe  which  so  tickled  Charles  that  he 
laughed  heartily,  and  said  to  Rochester,  "Odsfish!  Lory, 
your  chaplain  must  be  a  bishop;  therefore,  put  me  in 
mind  of  him  at  the  next  death."  But  South  was  no 
place-hunter;  it  was  no  sycophantic  motive  that  prompted 
his  sarcasm  at  the  Protector,  or  led  him  to  champion  the 
king  or  the  church.  During  the  reigns  of  both  Charles 
and  James  he  steadily  refused  a  bishopric.  Though  he 
disliked  James's  measures  regarding  the  Catholics,  his 
loyalty  never  wavered;  and  after  the  Prince  of  Orange 
ascended  the  throne,  it  was  some  time  before  he  acknowl 
edged  the  legality  of  the  revolution  settlement.  When 
offered  one  of  the  sees  vacated  by  the  non-juring  bishops, 
he  declined,  saying  "he  blessed  God  he  was  neither  so 
ambitious,  nor  in  want  of  preferment,  as,  for  the  sake 
of  it,  to  build  his  rise  upon  the  ruin  of  any  one  father 
of  the  church." 

During  the  last  years  of  his  life  he  suffered  from  pain 
ful  and  irritating  ailments,  yet  they  did  not  extinguish  his 
sprightliness  and  vivacity,  nor  did  his  wit  lose  any  of  its 
keenness.  In  1709  his  infirmities  were  so  great  that  the 
eyes  of  eager  expectants  were  turned  to  him,  in  hopes  of  a 
speedy  vacancy  in  his  prebend's  stall  and  rectory.  There  is 
a  characteristic  letter  to  Halifax  from  Swift,  who  coveted 
the  place,  and  was  impatient  at  South's  tenacity  of  life,  in 
which  he  writes:  "Pray,  my  lord,  desire  Dr.  South  to  die 


70  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

about  the  fall  of  the  leaf,  for  he  has  a  prebend  of  West 
minster,  which  will  make  me  your  neighbor;"  to  which 
Halifax  replies,  October  6,  1709,  "Dr.  South  holds  out  still, 
but  he  cannot  be  immortal."  The  infirm  old  man  lingered, 
however,  seven  years  longer,  outliving  Halifax  himself,  and 
ended  his  laborious  life  on  the  8th  of  July,  1716,  at  the  age 
of  eighty-three. 

The  life  and  writings  of  South  show  that  he  was  a  man 
of  powerful  intellect,  a  worthy  compeer  of  Hooker,  Barrow, 
and  Taylor, —  in  short,  one  of  the  giants  of  English  the 
ology.  While  his  writings  have  not  the  depth  and  sugges- 
tiveness  of  Hooker's,  nor  that  mighty  and  sustained  power 
controlled  by  the  severest  logic,  that  peculiar  quality  of 
mastery  and  vigor  to  which  all  tasks  appear  equally  easy, 
which  we  find  in  Barrow,  and  while  we  miss  in  his  page 
the  imaginative  fancies,  the  exquisite  and  subtle  harmony 
which  delight  us  in  the  sweet  poet  of  theology,  we  find  in 
South's  works  a  vigorous  and  sterling  sense,  a  sharp  and 
piercing  wit,  and  a  terseness,  vitality,  and  freshness  of 
expression  which  are  surpassed  in  no  other  English  dis 
courses.  To  a  large  and  acute  understanding,  he  united  a 
frank  and  courageous  nature,  and  what  he  believed  and  felt 
he  never  feared  to  utter.  Nice,  squeamish  persons,  who 
dislike  to  hear  ugly  things  called  by  ugly  names,  and  prefer 
dainty,  mincing  terms,  weighed  in  a  hair-balance  of  pro 
priety  and  good  breeding,  to  the  blunt  and  homely  language 
in  which  honest  indignation  is  wont  to  vent  itself,  will  not 
relish  his  Spartan  plainness  of  speech.  They  would  have 
liked  him  better  had  he  sought  what  an  old  poet  calls 

'•Modoft,  close-couched  terms 
Cleanly  to  gird  our  looser  libertines." 

But  whatever  other  faults  may  be  laid  to  his  charge,  he 


ROBERT  SOUTH.  71 

was  evidently  no  flincher,  no  trimmer;  he  was  not  "pigeon- 
livered,  or  lacking  gall."  Vice  he  never  feared  to  denounce, 
in  high  places  or  low,  nor  did  he  hesitate  to  declare  the 
whole  counsel  of  God  to  an  unprincipled  monarch  and  a 
dissolute  court,  whom  his  theories  of  political  government 
led  him  to  look  up  to  with  feelings  of  reverence.  Tory  as 
he  was,  there  are  passages  in  his  sermons  which  must  have 
made  the  cheeks  of  Charles  and  his  sycophants  tingle.  A 
warm  friend  and  an  outspoken  enemy,  he  had  no  reserves 
nor  disguises,  and  always  championed  his  principles  a 
routrance.  Wherever  his  tiword  fell,  it  always  fell  with 
the  whole  vigor  of  his  arm,  and  he  was  satisfied  with 
nothing  less  than  cleaving  his  opponent  from  crown  to 
chin.  He  never  stopped  to  consider  what  expression  would 
be  most  politic,  or  to  hunt  up  dainty,  holiday  terms  by 
which  to  characterize  an  opponent.  No  one  can  doubt  that 
he  would  have  fought,  if  necessary,  with  the  same  spirit 
that  he  wrote;  and,  indeed,  during  Monmouth's  rebellion, 
he  declared  he  was  ready,  if  there  should  be  occasion,  to 
change  his  black  gown  for  a  buff  coat.  That  he  was  a 
bigot  in  politics  and  religion,  who  could  brook  no  dissent 
from  his  own  rooted  and  ultra  opinions,  is  too  true;  but 
this  fault  becomes  almost  a  virtue  when  contrasted  with 
the  opposite  vices  of  cringing  servility,  hypocrisy,  and  cant, 
which  at  the  Kestoration  were  almost  universal. 

South's  writings  are  a  storehouse  of  vehement  expres 
sion,  such  as  can  be  found  in  no  other  English  writer.  He 
had  at  his  command  the  whole  vocabulary  of  abuse,  satire, 
and  scorn,  and,  when  his  ire  was  aroused,  he  was  never 
niggard  of  the  treasures  of  his  indignant  rhetoric.  Words 
were  the  only  weapons  which  his  sacred  calling  allowed 
him  to  use;  but  words,  as  he  employed  them,  were  sharper 


72  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

than  "  drawn  swords."  Radical  editors  should  study  his 
writings  day  and  night;  nowhere  else  (except  in  Milton) 
will  they  find  such  biting  words  and  stinging  phrases  with 
which  to  denounce  wicked  men,  wicked  institutions,  and 
wicked  practices.  The  intensity  of  thought  and  feeling 
which  burns  through  his  writings  has  hardly  any  parallel 
in  English  literature.  It  has  been  compared  to  the  un 
wearied  fire  of  the  epic  poet.  There  are  times  when  he 
seems  to  wrestle  with  his  subject,  as  if  he  would  grind  it 
into  powder ;  and  when  he  seems  to  say  all  that  he  does  say 
to  us,  only  that  we  may  conjecture  how  much  more  he 
could  say  if  he  were  able  to  wreak  bis  thoughts  upon 
expression.  It  has  been  truly  said  that  many  sentences  in 
his  works  appear  torn  from  his  brain  by  main  strength, 
expressing  not  only  the  thought  he  intended  to  convey,  but 
a  kind  of  impatient  rage  that  it  did  not  come  with  less 
labor.  With  all  his  command  of  language,  he  seems  often 
to  struggle  with  it  in  order  to  wrest  from  it  words  enough 
for  his  wealth  of  thought.  He  wrote  doubtless  from  his 
own  consciousness  when  he  represented  study  as  racking 
the  inward  and  destroying  the  outward  man, —  as  clothing 
the  soul  with  the  spoils  of  the  body, —  and  as  that  which, 
"like  a  stronger  blast  of  lightning,  not  only  melts  the 
sword,  but  consumes  the  scabbard." 

His  sermons  on  "Extempore  Prayer,"  "  Covetousness," 
"Education,"  "The  Fatal  Imposture  and  Force  of  Words," 
"  Shamelessness  in  Sin,"  and  "  Prosperity  ever  Danger 
ous  to  Virtue,"  are  masterpieces  of  their  kind,  full  of 
of  striking  thoughts  that  root  themselves  in  the  mem 
ory  of  every  thoughtful  reader.  It  would  be  difficult  to 
find  in  any  other  sermons  so  many  aphorisms  and  maxims 
having  a  direct  bearing  on  life  and  duty, —  so  many  terse 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  73 

sayings  which  are  true,  though  not  obvious,  or  moral 
reflections  sharpened  into  epigrams.  "  When  Providence," 
he  says,  "  designs  strange  and  mighty  changes,  it  gives  men 
wings  instead  of  legs;  and  instead  of  climbing  leisurely, 
makes  them  fly  at  once  to  the  top  and  height  of  greatness 
and  power."  Of  ingratitude  he  says  that  it  is  "  too  base  to 
return  a  kindness,  and  too  proud  to  regard  it;  much  like 
the  tops  of  the  mountains,  barren  indeed,  but  yet  lofty; 
they  produce  nothing;  they  feed  nobody;  they  clothe  no 
body;  yet  are  high  and  stately,  and  look  down  upon  all 
the  world  about  them." 

Again,  he  speaks  of  the  politician  as  "  treating  gratitude 
as  a  worse  kind  of  witchcraft,  which  only  serves  to  conjure 
up  the  pale,  meagre  ghosts  of  dead  and  forgotten  kindnesses 
to  haunt  and  trouble  him."  Of  prayer  he  says:  "Know 
that  the  lower  thou  fallest,  the  higher  will  thy  prayer 
rebound."  Again  he  observes:  "God  does  not  command  us 
to  set  off  our  prayers  with  dress  and  artifice,  to  flourish  it 
in  trope  and  metaphor,  and  to  beg  our  daily  bread  in  blank 
verse,  or  to  show  anything  of  the  poet  in  our  devotions 
but  indigence  and  want.  .  .  .  Does  not  he  present  his 
Maker  not  only  with  a  more  decent,  but  also  more  free  and 
liberal  oblation,  who  tenders  Him  much  in  little,  and 
brings  Him  his  whole  heart  and  soul  wrapped  up  in  three 
or  four  words,  than  he  who,  with  full  mouth  and  loud 
lungs,  sends  up  whole  vollies  of  articulate  breath  to  the 
throne  of  grace?  No  doubt  God  accounts  and  accepts  of 
the  former  as  infinitely  a  more  valuable  offering  than  the 
latter;  as  that  subject  pays  his  prince  a  much  nobler  and 
more  acceptable  tribute  who  tenders  him  a  purse  of  gold 
than  he  who  brings  him  a  whole  cart-load  of  farthings, — 
in  which  there  is  weight  without  worth,  and  number  with- 


74  ROBERT  «SOUTH. 

out  account."  Again  he  observes  on  the  same  subject: 
"  It  is  not  length,  nor  copiousness  of  language,  that  is 
devotion,  any  more  than  bulk  and  bigness  is  valor,  or  flesh 
the  measure  of  the  spirit.  A  short  sentence  may  oftentimes 
be  a  large  and  a  mighty  prayer.  Devotion  so  managed  is 
like  water  in  a  well,  where  you  have  fullness  in  a  little 
compass;  which  surely  is  much  nobler  than  the  same  car 
ried  out  into  many  little  petit,  creeping  rivulets,  with 
length  and  shallowness  together." 

South's  style  is  more  modern  than  that  of  any  other 
divine  of  his  century.  It  is  fervid,  forcible,  and  flexible, 
often  rhythmic,  never  obscure;  and  readily  adapts  itself 
to  all  the  demands  of  his  thought. 

William  Cobbett,  who,  we  fear,  did  not  "  reck  his  own 
rede,"  says:  "A  man,  as  he  writes  on  a  sheet  of  paper 
a  word  or  a  sentence,  ought  to  bear  in  mind  that  he  is 
writing  something  which  may,  for  good  or  evil,  live  for 
ever."  How  much  more  momentous  is  the  same  thought 
as  expressed  by  South, — "He  who  has  published  an  ill 
book  must  know  that  his  guilt  and  his  life  determine  not 
together;  no,  such  an  one,  as  the  Apostle  saith,  'Being 
dead,  yet  speaketh1;  he  sins  in  his  very  grave,  corrupts 
others  while  he  is  rotting  himself,  and  has  a  growing 
account  in  the  other  world  after  he  has  paid  Nature's 
last  debt  in  this;  and,  in  a  word,  quits  this  life  like  a 
man  carried  off  by  the  plague,  who,  though  he  dies  him 
self,  does  execution  upon  others  by  a  surviving  infliction." 

Speaking  of  the  dependence  of  the  intellectual  man 
upon  the  physical,  he  observes  that  while  the  soul  is  a 
sojourner  in  the  body,  "it  must  be  content  to  submit  its 
own  quickness  and  spirituality  to  the  dullness  of  its 
vehicle,  and  to  comply  with  the  pace  of  its  inferior 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  75 

companion, — just  like  a  man  shut  up  in  a  coach,  who, 
while  he  is  so,  must  be  willing  to  go  no  faster  than  the 
motion  of  the  coach  will  carry  him.1'  In  denouncing 
intemperance,  he  pithily  says:  "He  who  makes  his  belly 
his  business,  will  quickly  come  to  have  a  conscience  of  as 
large  a  swallow  as  his  throat."  In  a  sermon  on  educa 
tion,  he  satirizes  some  schoolmasters  as  executioners  rather 
than  instructors  of  youth,  and  says  that  "  stripes  and 
blows  are  fit  only  to  be  used  on  those  who  carry  their 
brains  in  their  backs."  Pride  he  declares  to  have  been 
"the  devil's  sin  and  the  devil's  ruin,  and  has  been,  ever 
since,  the  devil's  stratagem;  who,  like  an  expert  wrestler, 
usually  gives  a  man  a  lift  before  he  gives  him  a  throw." 
Of  misrepresentation  he  forcibly  says:  "It  is  this  which 
revives  and  imitates  that  inhuman  barbarity  of  the  old 
heathen  persecutors,  wrapping  up  Christians  in  the  skins 
of  wild  beasts,  that  so  they  might  be  worried  and  torn 
in  pieces  by  dogs.  Do  but  paint  an  angel  black,  and  that 
is  enough  to  make  him  pass  for  a  devil."  To  be  angry 
under  the  dispensations  of  Providence  he  pronounces  the 
height  of  folly,  as  well  as  wickedness.  "A  man  so  behav 
ing  himself  is  nothing  else  but  weakness  and  nakedness 
setting  itself  in  battle  array  against  Omnipotence;  a 
handful  of  dust  and  ashes  sending  a  challenge  to  the  host 
of  heaven.  For  what  else  are  words  and  talk  against 
thunderbolts;  and  the  weak,  empty  noise  of  a  querulous 
rage  against  him  who  can  speak  worlds,  who  could  word 
heaven  and  earth  out  of  nothing,  and  can,  when  he 
pleases,  word  them  into  nothing  again?"  One  of  his 
most  vivid  and  striking  images,  conveyed  with  a  Mil- 
tonian  roll  and  grandeur  of  expression,  illustrates  the 
seeming  strength  which  a  revengeful  spirit  acquires  from 


76  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

resistance.  "As  a  storm  could  not  be  so  hurtful,  were  it 
not  for  the  opposition  of  trees  and  houses,  it  ruins  no 
where  but  where  it  is  withstood  and  repelled.  It  has, 
indeed,  the  same  force  when  it  passes  over  the  rush  or 
the  yielding  osier;  but  it  does  not  roar  or  become  dread 
ful  till  it  grapples  with  the  oak,  and  rattles  upon  the 
tops  of  the  cedars."  Denouncing  ignorance  in  public 
men,  he  says:  "A  blind  man  sitting  in  the  chimney  corner 
is  pardonable  enough,  but  sitting  at  the  helm,  he  is 
intolerable.  If  owls  will  not  be  hooted  at,  let  them  keep 
close  within  the  tree,  and  not  perch  upon  the  upper 
boughs."  These  pithy  and  pointed  sayings  are  not  rare 
and  occasional  gems  that  gleam  on  us  at  long  intervals 
in  South's  writings,  and  reward  us  only  after  we  have 
sifted  heaps  of  verbiage,  but  sparkle  on  every  page, —  we 
had  almost  said  in  every  paragraph. 

South  had  a  keen  insight  of  human  nature.  He  had 
thoroughly  anatomized  the  human  heart,  and  laid  bare 
its  complex  web  of  motives;  and  hence  there  is  no 
"  pleasant  vice,"  no  self-gratulating  hypocrisy,  no  evasion 
of  duty  under  a  complacent  admission  of  its  claims,  no 
self-cheating  delusion,  no  sham  sentiment,  that  hides  its 
true  character  from  his  searching  glance.  He  "strips 
vice  and  folly  of  their  frippery,  scatters  the  delusions  of 
pride  and  passion,  and  lays  down  the  rule  of  Christian 
faith  and  practice  with  a  precision  which  satisfies  the 
intellect,  while  it  leaves  the  transgressor  without  an 
excuse." 

South  never  juggles  nor  coquets  with  words;  he  has 
no  verbal  prudery;  and  hence  he  excels  in  expressive 
coarseness  of  language,  or  felicities  of  vulgar  metaphor: 
as  when  he  speaks  of  "that  numerous  litter  of  strange, 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  77 

senseless,  absurd  opinions,  that  crawl  about  the  world,  to 
the  disgrace  of  reason";  or  says  of  the  pleasures  of  the 
eating  man  and  the  thinking  man,  that  they  are  "as 
different  as  the  silence  of  Archimedes  in  the  study  of  a 
problem,  and  the  stillness  of  a  sow  at  her  wash."  Again, 
wishing  to  show  that  pleasure  is  merely  a  relative  term, 
that  what  is  such  to  one  being  may  be  pain  to  another, 
he  says:  "The  pleasures  of  an  angel  can  never  be  the 
pleasures  of  a  hog."  Provided  he  can  make  his  meaning 
clear,  he  never  troubles  himself  about  the  niceties,  ele 
gancies,  and  refinements  of  expression;  and  his  strongest 
terms  are  often  what  an  old  dramatist  calls  "  plain,  naked 
words,  stript  of  their  shirts." 

It  is  by  their  wit  that  the  sermons  of  South  are 
chiefly  known,  and  against  no  class  of  persons  is  it  more 
frequently  or  more  mercilessly  directed  than  against  the 
Puritans,  whose  "  heavenly  hummings  and  hawings,"  as 
well  as  their  "  blessed  breathings,"  he  never  tires  of 
ridiculing.  Regarding  the  Church  of  England  royalists 
as  "  the  best  Christians  and  the  most  meritorious  subjects 
in  the  world,"  it  is  not  strange  that  he  delighted  to 
satirize  the  sectarians  with  whom  the  country  was  over 
run, —  the  preachers  of  the  tub  and  the  barn, —  who 
denied  the  divine  right  of  kings,  declared  that  men  should 
"  be  able  to  make  a  pulpit  before  they  preached  in  it," 
and  held,  as  he  believed,  all  human  learning  in  contempt. 
Gifted  with  a  razor-like  wit,  and  exquisitely  sensitive  to 
the  comic  and  the  grotesque,  he  dwelt  with  delight  on 
their  meagre,  mortified  faces,  their  droning  and  snuf 
fling  whine,  their  sanctimonious  look  and  demeanor;  and 
with  a  proud  consciousness  of  superior  bearing,  and  a 
somewhat  pharisaical  conceit  of  superior  integrity — with 


78  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

the  keenest  sarcasm  and  the  most  undisguised  contempt, 
—  held  up  to  the  scorn  of  mankind  those  whom  he  deemed 
impudent  pretenders  to  the  gifts  of  the  Spirit.  That  in 
his  perpetual  gibing  at  rebels  and  schismatics,  he  some 
times  trembles  on  the  verge  of  buffoonery, —  that  his  wit 
and  humor,  even  on  more  sacred  themes,  often  border  on 
grossness  and  indelicacy, —  cannot  be  denied.  South  knew 
the  truth  of  Horace's  maxim: 

"Ridicule  acri 
Fortius  et  melius  magnas  plerumqne  secatis." 

But  just  as  he  begins  to  disgust  us  by  his  coarseness,  he 
almost  invariably  recovers  himself  by  some  stroke  of  vig 
orous  sense  and  language;  and  his  excuse  is  to  be  found 
in  the  fact  that  he  lived  in  an  age  of  sinners  whose  rhi 
noceros  skin  of  impudence  was  not  penetrable  by  nice, 
mincing  phrases,  but  needed  to  be  lashed  with  a  whip 
of  scorpions,  or  branded  with  the  hot  iron. 

A  few  specimens  of  South's  wit  are  all  that  we  shall 
have  space  to  give.  Of  Popery  and  Puritanism,  which  in 
his  opinion  were  one,  he  says:  "  They  were  as  truly  brothers 
as  Romulus  and  Remus.  They  sucked  their  principles  from 
the  same  wolf."  Sometimes  he  despatches  the  Puritans 
with  the  short  dagger  of  a  single  phrase,  as  where  he 
terms  them  "those  seraphic  pretenders,"  or  speaks  of 
"  this  apocalyptic  ignoramus."  .  Of  the  greatness  and  lustre 
of  the  Romish  clergy,  he  says:  "We  envy  them  neither 
their  scarlet  gowns,  nor  their  scarlet  sins."  In  allusion 
to  the  many  persons  who  in  his  time  rushed  into  the 
ministry  without  serving  an  apprenticeship, '  he  observes 
that  "  matters  have  been  brought  to  this  pass,  that  if  a 
man  amongst  his  sons  had  any  blind  or  disfigured,  he 
laid  him  aside  for  the  ministry;  and  such  a  one  was  pres- 


ROBERT   SOUTH.  79 

ently  approved,  as  having  a  mortified  countenance."  Of 
the  perversity  of  the  Israelites,  he  observes  that  "  God 
seems  to  have  espoused  them  to  Himself  upon  the  very 
same  account  that  Socrates  espoused  Xantippe,  only  for 
her  extreme  ill  conditions,  as  the  fittest  argument  both 
to  exercise  and  to  declare  His  admirable  patience  to  the 
world."  Speaking  of  the  paradoxes  maintained  by  the 
Greek  sophists,  he  declares:  "Such  a  stupidity  or  wanton 
ness  had  seized  upon  the  most  raised  wits,  that  it  might 
be  doubted  whether  the  philosophers  or  the  owls  of  Athens 
were  the  quicker  sighted."  Ridiculing  the  idolatry  of 
the  Egyptians,  he  asks:  "Is  it  not  strange  that  a  rational 
man  should  worship  an  ox,  nay,  the  image  of  an  ox? 
fawn  upon  his  dog?  bow  himself  before  a  cat?  adore  leeks 
and  garlic,  and  shed  penitential  tears  at  the  smell  of  a 
deified  onion?  Yet  so  did  the  Egyptians,  once  the  famed 
masters  of  all  arts  and  learning."  Again,  quoting  Isaiah 
xliv,  14,  "  A  man  hews  him  down  a  tree  in  the  wood, 
and  a  part  of  it  he  burns,"  and  in  verses  16,  17,  "  with 
the  residue  thereof  he  maketh  a  god,"  South  thus  com 
ments:  "With  the  one  part  he  furnishes  his  chimney, 
with  the  other  his  chapel.  A  strange  thing,  that  the  fire 
must  first  consume  this  part,  and  then  burn  incense  to 
that.  As  if  there  was  more  divinity  in  one  end  of  the 
stick,  than  in  the  other;  or  as  if  it  could  be  graved  and 
painted  omnipotent,  or  the  nails  and  the  hammer  could 
give  it  an  apotheosis."  Of  sensualists,  he  says:  "  Saying 
grace  is  no  part  of  their  meal;  they  feed  and  grovel 
like  swine  under  an  oak,  filling  themselves  with  the  mast, 
but  never  so  much  as  looking  up,  either  to  the  boughs 
that  bore,  or  the  hands  that  shook  it  down." 

Henry   Ward    Beecher    declares    that    in   his   younger 


80  ROBERT   SOUTH. 

days  he  was  a  great  reader  of  the  old  sermonizers.  "  I 
read  old  Robert  South  through  and  through.  I  saturated 
myself  with  South.  I  formed  much  of  my  style,  and  of 
my  handling  of  texts  on  his  methods."  Let  the  rising 
generation  of  preachers  follow  this  example,  and  if  there 
is  not  less  complaint  of  the  lack  of  freshness,  force,  and 
energy  in  the  pulpit,  W3  are  sure  the  complaint  will 
cease  to  be  well  founded. 


CHARLES  H.  SPURGEON. 


"  TTT^HO  has  not  seen  Naples,  has  seen  nothing,"  say 
*  ^  the  Italians ;  who  has  not  heard  Mr.  Spurgeon, 
has  not  heard  the  greatest  of  living  preachers,  will  say 
hundreds,  not  only  of  Englishmen,  but  of  Americans,  who 
have  listened  to  the  burning  words  of  a  Beecher,  a  Liddon, 
a  Punshon,  or  a  Hall.  To  visit  London  without  seeing  the 
Metropolitan  Tabernacle  and  its  preacher,  would  be  like 
visiting  Rome  without  seeing  St.  Peter's,  or  making  the 
tour  of  America  without  beholding  Niagara.  For  this 
reason  and  a  mixture  of  others,  we  left  our  hotel  on  a  fine 
Sabbath  morning, —  the  6th  of  August,  1871, —  and,  mount 
ing  an  omnibus  bound  for  "  The  Elephant  and  Castle," 
were  soon  on  the  Surrey  side  of  the  Thames,  and  presently 
at  our  point  of  destination.  The  Tabernacle,  so  noted 
among  churches,  we  found  to  be  a  plain,  but  massive 
church  of  brick,  adorned  with  Corinthian  pillars,  standing 
back  from  the  street,  and  inclosed  with  an  iron  fence. 
Although  the  gate  to  the  inclosure  was  not  yet  open,  a 
crowd  of  persons  had  already  collected,  half  an  hour  before 
the  service  began,  waiting  impatiently  for  admission. 
Upon  stating  that  we  were  an  American,  a  ticket  of  admis 
sion  was  at  once  handed  to  us,  and  we  entered  the  building 
just  as  it  was  beginning  to  fill.  Glancing  around,  we  were 
struck  with  the  resemblance  of  the  vast  audience-room  to 
that  of  a  large  theatre.  At  the  farther  end  is  a  stage-like 
platform,  with  a  moveable  table  on  castors  and  a  few  chairs; 


82  CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON. 

and  just  below  it,  five  or  six  feet  above  the  main  floor,  there 
is  an  orchestra-like  inclosure,  filled  with  a  large  number  of 
bright-looking  and  neatly-dressed  boys.  Running  round 
the  church  are  three  galleries,  one  above  another, —  the 
whole  forming  one  of  the  best  arrangements  for  seeing  and 
hearing  that  could  be  contrived.  Seating  ourselves  in  the 
lower  gallery,  at  just  the  right  distance  from  the  speaker, 
we  had  an  excellent  opportunity  both  to  see  and  listen. 
The  regular  congregation  having  been  seated,  the  doors 
were  thrown  open  to  the  crowd,  when  a  mighty  tide  of 
human  beings  surged  into  the  aisles,  filling  every  standing- 
place,  sitting-place,  nook  and  corner  of  the  building,  till  it 
seemed  impossible  for  another  man  or  child  to  squeeze  him 
self  in.  Never  have  we  seen  an  audience  more  densely 
packed, —  not  even  when  Jenny  Lind  sang  the  first  night  at 
Tremont  Temple  in  Boston,  of  the  rapt  attention  of  the 
dense  throng  on  which  occasion  this  strongly  reminded  us. 
Even  in  the  uppermost  gallery,  which  is  a  good  way 
toward  heaven,  many  persons  were  standing  for  lack  of 
seats. 

The  house  filled,  Mr.  Spurgeon  at  once  steps  from  a 
back  door  upon  the  platform,  followed  by  the  elders  of  the 
church,  who  sit  just  behind  him.  In  his  physiognomy 
and  general  appearance,  there  is  little  to  give  assurance  of 
a  great  orator.  Short,  stout,  and  muscular,  with  a  some 
what  square  face,  small,  sparkling  eyes,  a  well-formed  nose, 
.a  mouth  shaded  by  a  black  moustache,  and  a  general  air  of 
frankness,  straightforwardness,  and  honesty,  he  is  a  good 
type  of  the  Anglo-Saxon,  and  no  one  could  possibly  mistake 
him  for  a  native  of  any  other  country.  Natural,  decided, 
and  impressive  in  his  manner,  full  of  force  and  fire,  and 
speaking  in  a  loud,  bell-like  voice,  at  once  clear  in  its 


CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON.  83 

articulations  and  pleasant  in  its  tones,  he  rivets  your  atten 
tion  at  the  start,  though  precisely  what  is  the  secret  of  his 
hold  upon  you,  you  are  puzzled  to  tell.  He  begins  the 
service  with  prayer;  and  a  prayer  it  is,  a  real  outpouring 
of  the  heart  to  God,  not  an  oration  before  the  Almighty,  or 
an  eloquent  soliloquy.  He  is  evidently  not  one  of  those 
preachers  who,  as  South  says,  "  so  pray  that  they  do  not 
supplicate,  but  compliment  Almighty  God1';  he  believes, 
with  the  same  divine,  that  it  is  not  necessary  to  beg  our 
bread  in  blank  verse,  or  to  show  anything  of  the  poet  in 
our  devotions  but  indigence  and  want.  After  the  prayer 
comes  the  hymn,  read  in  a  clear,  impressive  voice;  and 
without  any  accompaniment,  either  of  organ  or  bass-viol, 
the  vast  assembly  of  six  thousand  or  seven  thousand  sound 
forth  the  notes  of  praise.  After  the  first  verse  has  been 
sung,  Mr.  Spurgeon  singing  with  his  people,  a  second  verse 
is  read  and  sung,  then  another  verse,  till  the  entire  hymn 
is  gone  through  with.  Before  worshipping  at  the  Taber 
nacle,  we  had  heard  the  fine  music  at  the  royal  chapel  at 
Whitehall,  and  listened  with  ravished  ears  to  the  echoing 
strains  of  the  trained  and  gowned  singers  in  St.  Paul's,  and 
to  the  pealing  organ  as  it  swelled  the  note  of  praise  in 
"  the  long-drawn  aisles  and  fretted  vaults  "  of  Westminster 
Abbey;  but  we  were  more  deeply  moved  by  this  simple 
praise, —  this  grand,  though  inartistic  song  of  joy, — welling 
up  from  these  Christian  hearts,  than  l)j  the  most  gorgeous 
music  that  ever  in  minster  or  cathedral  had  essayed  to 

"Dissolve  us  into  ecstasies, 
And  bring  all  Heaven  before  our  eyes." 

A  lesson  from  the  Scriptures  is  next  read,  accompanied 
with  a  pithy  and  suggestive  running  commentary,  and  the 
people  throughout  the  house  open  their  Bibles,  and  follow 


84  CHAELES   H.   SPURGEON. 

the  pastor  in  the  reading.  Another  hymn  is  given  out  and 
sung  as  before;  and  then  comes  the  sermon.  Though  fifty 
or  sixty  minutes  long,  it  is  listened  to  throughout  with  the 
profoundest  interest,  no  one,  not  even  of  the  listeners  who 
are  standing,  showing  any  signs  of  weariness.  The  text  is 
1  Corinthians  vi,  19,  20:  "Ye  are  not  your  own;  for  ye 
are  bought  with  a  price;  therefore  glorify  God  in  your 
body,  and  in  your  spirit,  which  are  God's.'1  The  subject  is 
considered  under  three  heads :  I,  The  blessed  fact,  "  Ye  are 
bought  with  a  price";  II,  The  plain  consequence  arising 
from  this  fact,  namely,  that,  1,  It  is  clear  as  a  negative,  that 
"Ye  are  not  your  own";  and,  2,  It  is  clear  as  a  positive, 
that  "  your  body  and  spirit  are  God's."  Ill,  The  natural 
conclusion,  "Therefore  glorify  God  in  your  body  and  in 
your  spirit." 

Under  the  second  head  the  speaker  observes:  "It  is  a 
great  privilege  not  to  be  one's  own.  A  vessel  is  drifting 
on  the  Atlantic  hither  and  thither,  and  its  end  no  man 
knoweth.  It  is  derelict,  deserted  by  all  its  crew;  it  is  the 
property  of  no  man;  it  is  the  prey  of  every  storm,  and  the 
sport  of  every  wind;  rocks,  quicksands,  and  shoals  wait  to 
destroy  it;  the  ocean  yearns  to  engulf  it.  It  drifts  onward 
to  no  man's  land,  and  no -man  will  mourn  its  shipwreck. 
But  mark  well  yonder  bark  of  the  Thames,  which  its  owner 
surveys  with  pleasure.  In  its  attempt  to  reach  the  sea  it 
may  run  ashore,  or  come  into  collision  with  other  vessels, 
or  in  a  thousand  ways  suiFer  damage;  but  there  is  no  fear, 
it  will  pass  through  the  floating  forest  of  '  the  Pool';  it  will 
thread  the  winding  channel,  and  reach  the  Nore,  because 
the  owner  will  secure  it  pilotage,  skillful  and  apt.  How 
thankful  you  and  I  should  be  that  we  are  not  derelict 
to-day!  We  are  not  our  own,  not  left  on  the  wild  waste 


CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON.  85 

of  chance  to  be  tossed  to  and  fro  by  fortuitous  circum 
stances,  but  there  is  a  hand  upon  the  helm;  we  have  on 
board  a  pilot  who  owns  us,  and  will  surely  steer  us  into  the 
Fair  Havens  of  eternal  rest."  Under  the  third  head,  Mr. 
Spurgeon  says:  "  Our  bodies  used  to  work  hard  enough  for 
the  devil;  now  they  belong  to  God,  we  will  make  them 
work  for  Him.  Your  legs  used  to  carry  you  to  the  theatre; 
be  not  too  lazy  to  come  out  on  a  Thursday  night  to  the 
house  of  God.  Your  eyes  have  often  been  open  on  iniquity ; 
keep  them  open  during  the  sermon,  do  not  drop  asleep! 
Your  ears  have  been  sharp  enough  to  catch  the  words  of  a 
lascivious  song;  let  them  be  quick  to  observe  the  word 
of  God.  Those  hands  have  often  squandered  your  earnings 
in  sinfulness;  let  them  give  freely  to  the  cause  of  Christ. 
Your  bodv  was  a  willing  horse  when  it  was  in  the  service 
of  the  devil ;  let  it  not  be  a  sluggish  hack  now  that  it  draws 
the  chariot  of  Christ.1' 

Again:  "  If  you  were  to  go  to  a  cattle-show,  and  it  were 
said,  '  Such  and  such  a  bullock  belongs  to  Her  Majesty,'  it 
may  be  that  it  is  no  better  than  another,  but  it  would  be 
of  interest  to  thousands  as  belonging  to  royalty.  See  here, 
then,  such  and  such  a  man  belongs  to  God;  what  manner 
of  person  ought  he  to  be?  If  there  be  any  one  in  this 
world  who  wi-ll  not  be  criticised,  depend  upon  it,  Christian, 
it  is  not  the  Christian;  sharp  eyes  will  be  upon  him,  and 
worldly  men  will  find  faults  in  him  which  they  would  not 
see  if  he  were  not  a  professor.  For  my  part,  I  am  very 
glad  of  the  lynx  eyes  of  the  worldlings.  Let  them  watch, 
if  they  will.  I  have  heard  of  one  who  was  a  great  caviller 
at  Christian  people,  and  after  having  annoyed  a  church  a 
long  time,  he  was  about  to  leave,  and,  therefore,  as  a  part 
ing  jest  with  the  minister,  he  said,  '  I  have  no  doubt  you 


86  CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON". 

will  be  very  glad  to  know  that  I  am  going  a  hundred  miles 
away ! '  *  No,'  said  the  pastor,  '  I  shall  be  sorry  to  lose 
you.'  'How?  I  never  did  you  any  good.'  '  I  don't  know 
that,  for  I  am  sure  that  never  one  of  my  flock  put  half  a 
foot  through  the  hedge  but  what  you  began  to  yelp  at  him, 
and  so  you  have  been  a  famous  sheep-dog  for  me.'  I  am 
glad  the  world  observes  us.  It  has  a  right  to  do  so.  If  a 
man  says  'I  am  God's,'  he  sets  himself  up  for  public 
observation.  Ye  are  lights  in  the  world,  and  what  are 
lights  intended  for  but  to  be  looked  at?  A  city  set  on  a 
hill  cannot  be  hid." 

These  passages,  torn  from  the  context,  give  but  a 
faint  idea  of  the  sermon  as  a  whole,  which  was  a  mas 
terpiece  of  its  kind,  and  in  many  respects,  peculiar  and 
original.  After  service,  we  had  a  pleasant  interview  with 
the  preacher,  whom  we  found  lying  on  a  sofa  in  a  back 
room,  quite  exhausted  by  his  effort.  He  had  but  just 
recovered  from  a  severe  sickness,  this  being  his  second 
sermon  since  he  left  his  bed.  It  is  well  known  that  his 
exhausting  labors  and  burning  enthusiasm  have  begun  to 
tell  upon  his  physical  constitution.  The  sword  has  proved 
too  sharp  for  even  the  stout  scabbard.  Ten  years  ago 
preaching  was  almost  as  easy  to  him  as  singing  to  a 
bird.  To  electrify,  convince,  and  persuade  audiences  was 
a  labor  of  love.  Now  every  Sunday's  efforts  cost  him 
forty- eight  hours'  pain.  During  our  interview  a  gentle 
man  said  to  him  that  an  American  preacher  who  had 
heard  the  sermon  observed  at  its  close,  "That  discourse 
was  composed  in  this  house."  "  Did  he  say  so?"  exclaimed 
Mr.  Spurgeon.  "  That  is  remarkable.  The  text  was  given 
to  me  by  one  of  my  deacons,,  who  died  yesterday,  and 
requested  in  his  last  moments  that  I  would  preach  from 


CHARLES   H.   SPliRGEOtf.  8? 

it.  At  six  this  morning  I  sat  down  to  think  out  the 
discourse.  I  spent  an  hour  upon  the  text,  and  could 
make  nothing  of  it.  I  never  could  preach  from  other 
people's  texts.  I  said  this,  in  my  despair,  to  my  wife, 
who  told  me  to  try  again.  I  tried  again  with  the  same 
result.  '  Well,'  said  Mrs.  S.,  'go  into  the  pulpit,  and 
the  sermon  will  come  to  you.'  I  followed  the  advice, 
and  you  know  the  result."  In  this  case  Mr.  Spurgeon 
must  have  spent  more  time  than  usual  in  preparation, 
for  it  is  said  that  he  commonly  devotes  but  a  half  hour 
to  this  purpose.  Only  the  heads  of  the  sermon  are  put 
on  paper;  all  the  rest  is  left  to  the  pulpit.  "If  I  had 
a  month  given  me  to  prepare  a  sermon,"  he  once  said 
to  a  visitor,  "  I  would  spend  thirty  days  and  twenty- 
three  hours  in  something  else,  and  in  the  last  hour  I 
would  make  the  sermon."  When  asked  by  the  same  per 
son  if  he  had  ever  written  a  discourse,  he  replied,  "  I 
would  rather  be  hanged." 

Yet  if  Mr.  S.  spends  but  little  time  in  immediate 
preparation,  he  spends  a  vast  deal  of  time  in  general 
preparation,  for  the  pulpit.  No  preacher  has  drunk  deeper 
draughts  from  the  old  English  divines,  or  saturated  his 
mind  more  thoroughly  with  the  spirit  of  God's  word. 
By  these  means  he  has  become  "  a  Leyden  jar,  charged 
to  a  plenum,"  in  Horace  Mann's  phrase,  and,  the  moment 
he  comes  in  contact  with  his  people,  gives  forth  the  elec 
tric  fire.  In  our  conversation  with  him,  we  observed 
that  we  would  not  call  the  sermon  eloquent;  it  was 
something  far  better  than  eloquence.  "  Oh,  no,"  was  the 
reply,  "  I  have  no  pretension  to  that  sort  of  thing.  I 
love  to  hear  eloquent  men,  you  know,  as  well  as  any 
body,  but  if  I  should  attempt  oratory,  I  should  be  sure 


88  CHARLES   H.   SPTJRGEOtf. 

to  fail."  In  the  same  spirit  he  lately  prefaced  a  lecture 
by  saying  that  he  had  never  yet  succeeded  in  the  art  of 
lecturing,  and  added,  "  If  any  of  you  have  ever  seen  a  goose 
trying  to  fly,  you  may  say,  '  That's  like  Mr.  Spurgeon 
trying  to  lecture.'  "  It  is  reported  that  a  noted  fanatic 
and  bore  once  called  to  see  him,  and,  being  asked  by  a 
deacon  what  name  he  should  announce  to  Mr.  S.,  re 
plied,  "  Say  that  a  servant  of  the  Lord  wants  to  see 
him."  "Tell  him,"  was  the  preacher's  reply,  "that  I 
am  engaged  with  his  Master."  Being  asked  whether  this 
anecdote  was  apocryphal,  he  smilingly  admitted  its  truth. 
Mr.  Spurgeon  has  a  good  deal  of  mother  wit,  and  even 
when  preaching  drops  from  time  to  time  a  shrewd,  pun 
gent  remark,  or  indulges  in  an  apt,  vivid  pictorial  illus 
tration,  that  causes  the  sea  of  upturned  faces  to  ripple 
with  a  smile.  In  a  recent  speech  in  Surrey,  at  the  lay 
ing  of  the  foundation  stone  of  a  new  chapel,  he  said  no 
money  was  to  be  placed  in  the  cavity  of  the  stone,  for 
he  could  not  see  the  use  of  burying  money,  and,  more 
over,  he  had  known  memorial  stones  to  move  suddenly 
during  the  night  when  money  had  been  placed  in  them. 
He  once  heard  a  man  say,  "  If  you  want  to  touch  my 
purse,  you  must  touch  my  heart,"  to  which  he  (Mr.  S.) 
replied,  "  I  believe  you,  because  there  is  where  you  keep 
your  heart."  Another  man  once  said  to  him:  "I  thought 
you  preached  for  souls,  and  not  for  money";  and  he  re 
plied:  "So  we  do,  but  we  can't  live  upon  souls,  and  if 
we  could,  it  would  take  a  large  number  such  as  yours 
to  make  a  single  breakfast."  At  a  recent  laying  of  the 
corner-stone  of  a  chapel,  he  told  the  people  how  he  con 
trived  to  secure  pure  air  in  a  church  where  the  windows 
were  so  rarely  opened  that  it  was  found  difficult  to  raise 


CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON.  89 

them.  "  It  was  so  close  and  hot,"  he  said,  "  that  I  asked 
every  gentleman  near  a  window  to  smash  a  pane  or  two. 
There  was  soon  a  very  grand  smash,  but  then  the  beau 
tiful  fresh  air  streamed  in.  I  paid  the  bill  afterwards 
like  an  honest  man;  but  it  was  much  better  to  do  that 
than  bear  the  cruelty  of  preaching  in  such  an  atmos 
phere,  or  forcing  people  to  listen  when  they  were  more 
disposed  to  sleep." 

What  is  the  secret  of  Mr.  Spurgeon's  power  as  a 
preacher?  That  he  is  the  greatest  of  living  European 
preachers,  if  not  the  first  in  the  world,  few  will  doubt. 
For  twenty  years  men  have  gathered  in  crowds  to  hear 
him.  Audiences  varying  from  5,000  to  9,000  have  con 
stantly  filled  the  houses  where  he  has  preached;  men  of 
all  classes  have  hung  upon  his  lips;  and  yet,  though  the 
"  fiery  soul  has  o'erinformed "  the  physical  frame,  and  he 
speaks  almost  always  with  some  pain,  there  is  no  flagging,  no 
symptom  of  abatement  in  the  eagerness  with  which  men 
listen.  You  must  still  go  early  to  secure  a  seat  in  the 
Tabernacle.  His  church  numbers  some  4,300  members. 
He  has  published  over  a  thousand  sermons.  More  than 
twenty  millions  of  his  discourses  have  been  circulated  in 
the  English  language,  and  they  have  been  translated  into 
all  the  languages  of  Christendom,  besides  being  translated 
to  some  extent  into  remote  heathen  tongues.  There  was 
a  time  when  it  was  fashionable  to  speak  of  him  as  "  vul 
gar,"  and  as  being  a  cometary  genius,  whose  splendor 
would  be  short-lived.  But  now  even  fashionable  people 
feel  compelled  to  hear  him,  and  scholars,  barristers,  mem 
bers  of  parliament,  and  peers  of  the  realm  acknowledge 
his  power.  How  shall  we  account  for  this?  Is  there 
anything  in  his  person  to  solve  the  mystery?  There 


90  CHARLES   H.   SPURGEOtf. 

have  been  orators  who  almost  by  the  magnetism  of  their 
presence  have  held  their  hearers  spell-bound.  Their  lofty 
and  commanding  forms,  their  god-like  foreheads,  flashing 
eyes,  and  general  port  and  bearing,  have  given  weight 
and  electric  force  to  their  words.  Such  was  the  case 
with  Whitefield,  Irving,  Chalmers,  and  other  great  pulpit 
orators,  who  impressed  men  by  their  looks  as  well  as  by 
their  utterances.  But  Spurgeon  has  nothing  of  this  sort 
to  magnetize  men  or  chain  their  attention.  There  is  no 
necromancy  in  his  face  or  figure.  Short  and  chubby  in 
figure,  with  a  round,  homely,  honest  face,  though  with 
an  expressive  eye,  he  is  Saxon  intus  et  in  cute;  and  though 
you  might  credit  him  with  strength  of  will  and  iron  en 
durance,  you  would  not  from  his  features  infer  great 
intellectual  power  or  ability  to  sway  the  hearts  of  men. 
Is  it  his  culture  that  gives  Mr.  Spurgeon  his  sway 
over  men?  Unquestionably  he  has  done  much  to  remedy 
his  lack  of  intellectual  equipment  since  he  began  to 
storm  the  hearts  of  his  hearers.  He  has  drunk  deep,  ox- 
like  draughts  from  the  Scriptures  and  from  the  old 
Puritan  divines.  He  has  spent  not  a  little  time,  we 
have  been  told,  in  the  study  of  Greek  and  Latin,  and 
has  enriched  his  vocabulary  with  words  drawn  from  the 
pure  "  wells  of  English  undefiled."  He  has  made  incur 
sions,  too,  into  the  broad  domains  of  science,  not  merely 
for  recreation,  or  to  gratify  his  intellectual  curiosity,  but 
for  the  more  definite  purpose  of  supplying  his  mind  with 
new  images  and  analogies.  According  to  a  statement  in 
the  London  "  World,"  he  has  not  only  given  attention  to 
astronomy,  chemistry,  zoology,  ornithology,  etc.,  but  field- 
sports,  also,  have  helped  to  enrich  his  fund  of  illustration. 
It  is  not  uncommon,  we  are  told,  to  find  him  engaged 


CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON.  91 

busily  over  a  pile  of  technical  books  on  fox-hunting  or 
salmon-fishing,  deer-stalking  or  grouse-shooting.  He  is  a 
strong  believer  in  the  theory  of  ventilating  the  mind, — 
of  pouring  a  stream  of  new  ideas  constantly  through  it, 
—  to  preserve  its  freshness,  and  prevent  the  stagnation 
not  unfrequently  brought  about  in  a  strong  intellect 
engrossed  in  one  pursuit.  All  this  explains  the  fresh  and 
breezy  vigor  of  his  preaching,  and  shows  why,  in  his 
thousands  of  sermons,  he  so  rarely  repeats  himself.  But, 
it  must  be  remembered,  he  did  not  begin  his  career  with 
the  advantage  of  a  liberal  education.  It  is  doubtful,  too, 
whether,  in  early  life,  he  had  either  the  taste,  the  appli 
ances,  or  the  leisure  for  the  scientific  and  literary  excur 
sions  he  now  makes.  He  is  not  a  scholar,  nor  a  trained 
theologian,  still  less  one  of  those  bookish  men  in  whom 
the  receptive  faculty  absorbs  the  generative,  and  the 
scholarhood  sucks  up  the  manhood;  nor  is  there  reason 
to  suppose  that,  by  any  amount  of  application,  he  could 
become 

"A  second  Thomas,  or  at  once, 
To  name  them  all,  another  Duns." 

Does  Mr.  Spurgeon's  voice  account  for  his  success? 
That  the  quality  of  the  voice  has  much  to  do  with  suc 
cess  in  oratory,  none  can  doubt.  Cicero  held  that,  "  for 
the  effectiveness  and  glory  of  delivery,  the  voice,  doubt 
less,  holds  the  first  place."  There  are  voices  that  electrify, 
voices  that  melt,  and  voices  that  appal.  It  is  said  that 
Chatham's  lowest  whisper  was  distinctly  audible;  his 
middle  tone  was  sweet,  rich,  and  beautifully  varied;  and 
when  he  raised  his  voice  to  its  high  pitch,  the  house  was 
completely  filled  with  the  volume  of  sound,  and  the  effect 
was  awful,  except  when  he  wished  to  cheer  and  animate, 


92  CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON. 

and  then  he  had  a  spirit-stirring  note  which  was  perfectly 
irresistible.  Henry  Clay's  voice  had  a  similar  flexibility. 
Soaring  with  the  grand  and  descending  with  the  pathetic, 
it  had  a  marvellous  compass,  and  its  trumpet  blasts  were 
not  more  audible  or  thrilling  than  its  veriest  whisper. 
Burke's  voice,  on  the  other  hand,  was  a  loud  cry,  which 
tended,  even  more  than  the  formality  of  his  discourses, 
to  send  the  M.  P.'s  to  their  dinners.  Mr.  Spurgeon's 
voice,  marvellous  as  it  is,  has  little  flexibility  or  compass. 
It  has  a  loud,  bell-like  ring,  but  is  a  comparatively  level 
voice,  with  little  variety  in  its  modulations,  though  very 
pleasing  in  its  tones.  Rarely  rising  to  a  trumpet  tone, 
it  never  descends  to  the  lowest  notes,  and,  above  all  other 
qualities,  it  is  remarkable  for  distinctness  and  force. 
Were  his  voice,  however,  ten  times  more  impressive  than 
it  is,  and  as  "  musical  as  Apollo's  lute,"  it  would  not  alone 
account  for  his  success,  for  it  might  be  vox  et  preterea 
nihil,  which  surely  would  soon  lose  its  charm. 

The  real  sources  of  Mr.  Spurgeon's  power  we  believe 
to  be  his  elocution,  his  style,  and  the  earnestness  that  grows 
out  of  a  profound  conviction  of  the  truth  of  what  he 
teaches.  His  delivery,  though  not  of  the  very  highest 
order,  is  wonderfully  natural  and  impressive.  There  is 
no  stiffness  or  affectation  in  it.  He  talks,  in  a  free,  off 
hand  way,  just  as  a  man  would  talk  with  his  friend. 
Even  when  most  impassioned,  he  speaks  in  colloquial 
tones,  never  for  a  moment  falling  into  what  the  old 
Scotch  woman,  rebuking  her  son  as  he  read  the  news 
paper,  called  "the  Bible  twang."  Again,  his  language  is 
as  simple  and  unaffected  as  his  manner.  It  is  chiefly 
plain,  nervous,  idiomatic  Saxon;  the  vocabulary,  not  of 
books,  but  of  the  market-place  and  the  fireside, — "  not  of 


CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON.  93 

the  university,  but  of  the  universe."  "  The  devil,"  he 
once  said,  "  does  not  care  for  your  dialectics,  and  eclectic 
homiletics,  or  Germanic  objectives  and  subjectives;  but 
pelt  him  with  Anglo-Saxon  in  the  name  of  God,  and  he 
will  shift  his  quarters."  Mr.  Spurgeon's  style,  like  that 
of  every  great  speaker,  is  individual  and  original, —  the 
outgrowth  and  exponent  of  his  whole  mental  character. 
It  is  plain,  straightforward,  luminously  transparent, —  a 
perfect  mirror  of  the  thought.  His  winged  words  have  a 
force  and  significance  which  they  do  not  bear  in  the 
dictionary,  and  hasten  to  their  mark  with  the  precision, 
rapidity,  and  directness  of  an  arrow.  No  shade  of  doubt 
weakens  the  dogmatic  decisiveness  of  the  idea;  no 
momentary  hesitation  checks  or  turns  aside  the  sure  and 
sweeping  current  of  the  expression.  He  has  no  meaning 
less  expletives  to  pad  out  his  sentences;  but  everywhere 
the  mind  of  the  speaker  is  felt  beating  and  burning 
beneath  his  language,  stamping  every  word  with  the 
image  of  a  thought. 

Besides  these  peculiarities  of  Mr.  Spurgeon's  style,  it 
is  remarkable  also  for  its  pictorial  power.  Few  pulpit- 
orators  abound  more  in  illustrations, —  especially  homely, 
yet  vivid,  illustrations  drawn  from  the  fireside,  the  street, 
the  market,  the  scenes  of  daily  life.  Piety  with  him  is 
not  a  thing  of  abstraction,  but  something  visible,  in  con 
crete  form.  "  If  I  am  a  Christian,"  he  said,  in  the  ser 
mon  we  heard,  "  I  have  no  right  to  be  idle.  I  saw  the 
other  day  men  using  picks  in  the  road  in  laying  down 
new  gas-pipes;  they  had  been  resting,  and,  just  as  I  passed, 
the  clock  struck  one,  and  the  foreman  gave  a  signal.  I 
think  he  said,  '  Blow  up; '  and  straightway  each  man  took 
his  pick  or  his  shovel,  and  they  were  all  at  it  in  earnest. 


94  CHARLES   H.   SPURGEON. 

Close  to  them  stood  a  fellow  with  a  pipe  in  his  mouth, 
who  did  not  join  in  the  work,  but  stood  in  a  free  and 
easy  posture.  It  did  not  make  any  difference  to  him 
whether  it  was  one  o'clock  or  six.  Why  not?  Because 
he  was  his  own;  the  other  men  were  the  master's  for 
the  time  being.  If  any  of  you  idle  professors  can  really 
prove  that  you  belong  to  yourselves,  I  have  nothing  more 
to  say  to  you;  but  if  you  profess  to  have  a  share  in  the 
redeeming  sacrifice  of  Christ,  I  am  ashamed  of  you  if  you 
do  not  go  to  work  the  very  moment  the  signal  is  given." 
Again,  take  the  following:  "The  world  has  a  right  to 
expect  more  from  the  Christian  than  from  anybody  else. 
Stand  in  fancy  in  one  of  the  fights  of  the  old  civil  war. 
The  Royalists  are  fighting  desperately  and  are  winning 
apace,  but  I  hear  a  cry  from  the  other  side  that  Crom 
well's  Ironsides  are  coming.  Now  we  shall  see  some  fight 
ing.  Oliver  and  his  men  are  lions.  But  lo!  I  see  that 
the  fellows  who  come  up  hang  fire,  and  are  afraid  to 
rush  into  the  thick  of  the  fight;  surely,  these  are  not 
Cromwell's  Ironsides,  and  yonder  Captain  is  not  old  Noll? 
I  do  not  believe  it;  it  cannot  be.  Why,  if  they  were  what 
they  profess  to  be,  they  would  have  broken  the  ranks  of 
those  perfumed  cavaliers  long  ago,  and  made  them  fly 
before  them  like  chaff  before  the  wind.  So  when  I  hear 
men  say,  'Here  is  a  body  of  Christians.'  What!  Those 
Christians?  Those  cowardly  people  who  hardly  dare  speak 
a  word  for  Jesus!  Those  covetous  people,  who  give  a 
few  cheese-parings  to  His  cause!  Those  inconsistent  peo 
ple  whom  you  would  not  know  to  be  Christian  professors 
if  they  did  not  label  themselves!  What!  such  beings  fol 
lowers  of  a  crucified  Saviour?" 

Lastly,  men   love   to    hear    Mr.  Spurgeon,  because,  as 


CHARLES   H.   SPUKGEON.  95 

Sheridan  said  of  Rowland  Hill,  "  his  ideas  come  red-hot 
from  the  heart"  Wesley  once  said  to  his  brother  Charles, 
who  was  drawing  him  away  from  a  mob,  in  which  some 
coarse  women  were  vituperating  in  eloquent  billingsgate, 
"  Stop,  Charles,  and  learn  how  to  preach."  The  earnest 
ness,  courage,  and  passion  which  made  these  fishwomen 
eloquent  in  a  petty  squabble,  Wesley  thought,  if  trans 
ferred  to  the  pulpit,  could  not  fail  powerfully  to  move 
the  hearts  of  the  people.  Mr.  Spurgeon  is  not  a  sensa 
tional  preacher,  nor  a  maker  of  fine  phrases,  a  lettered 
and  polished  orator.  He  is  unlike  as  possible  those 
clerical  icicles  with  whom  the  artistic  air  kills  every 
thing,  and  whose  greatest  fault  is  that  they  are  absolutely 
faultless.  He  is  no  less  unlike  those  clerical  Jehus  who 
take  delight  in  sweeping  with  their  chariot-wheels  to  the 
very  edge  of  some  precipice  of  heresy,  so  as  to  call  forth 
a  shriek  from  startled  orthodox  nerves.  He  has  no  half 
beliefs,  no  sickly  sentimentalism,  no  mental  reservations, 
but  a  direct,  intense,  Bunyan-like  apprehension  of  the  Gos 
pel  of  Christ,  and  he  preaches  it  fully  and  fervidly,  as  God 
has  given  him  ability,  to  mankind.  Believing  in  the 
truths  of  revelation  with  his  whole  soul, —  tormented 
with  none  of  those  lurking  doubts,  that  semi-skepticism 
which  so  often  paralyzes  the  pulpit  in  our  day, —  reject 
ing  utterly  what  he  regards  as  a  Christless  Christianity, 
from  which  the  supernatural  element  has  been  eliminated, 
—  he  urges  those  truths  home  upon  his  hearers  with  the 
whole  force  of  his  nature.  Supremely  indifferent  to  the 
modern  philosophic  statements,  the  literary  refinements 
of  doctrine, —  regarding  with  utter  scorn  the  nice,  hair 
splitting  discriminations  between  what  we  may  know  of 
a  doctrine  and  what  we  may  not,  that  leave  us  in  the 


96  CHARLES  H.  SPUKGEON. 

end  with  hardly  anything  to  know  about  it, —  he  proclaims, 
Sabbath  after  Sabbath,  without  abatement,  mincing,  or 
softening,  those  grand  old  truths,  as  he  regards  them, 
which  Calvin,  and  Augustine,  and  Paul  proclaimed  before 
him.  And  what  has  been  the  result?  As  he  himself 
once  said  to  a  lady  who  observed  that  the  secret  of  his 
success  was  Christ,  and  Christ  only,  he  is  "  constantly 
striking  on  the  old  piece  of  iron,  and  it  is  no  wonder 
that  it  sometimes  gets  hot."  While  those  timid  preachers 
of  the  modern  school,  who 

"Would  not  in  a  peremptory  tone 
Assert  the  nose  on  their  face  their  own," 

and  who  know  just  how  much  truth  it  is  prudent  to 
dole  out,  are  left  to  utter  their  nicely-turned  periods  to 
empty  pews,  this  Puritanic  preacher,  who  comes  from 
what  John  Foster  calls  "  the  morass  of  Anabaptism,"  is 
listened  to  with  such  delight,  that  even  from  a  church 
that  holds  six  or  seven  thousand  souls,  hundreds  go 
away,  Sabbath  after  Sabbath,  unable  to  find  a  standing- 
place.  He  is  a  living  refutation  of  the  statement,  so  often 
and  so  confidently  made,  that  the  preacher  of  our  day 
who  stays  in  what  are  called  "  the  old  ruts  "  of  theology, 
and  who  takes  no  stock  in  the  modern  "  progressive  ideas," 
has  lost  his  hold  upon  the  people;  and  proves,  beyond 
all  gainsaying,  that,  even  in  this  age  of  Darwins  and 
Huxleys  and  Mills,  the  most  popular  pulpit  orator  is  not 
he  who  panders  to  their  love  of  excitement,  novelty,  or 
rhetoric,  but  he  who  thunders  forth  with  ceaseless  itera 
tion  those  grand  old  truisms,  which,  even  in  this  day  of 
new  theologies,  are  still  the  best  things  left  upon  the 
earth. 


RECOLLECTIONS  OF  JUDGE  STORY. 


TN  the  year  1836  the  writer  entered  the  Law  School  at 
-*-  Cambridge,  and  saw  for  the  first  time  Judge  Story, 
whose  pupil  he  was  for  some  two  years  to  be.  Earely 
has  the  physiognomy  of  a  distinguished  man,  whose  looks 
we  had  previously  pictured  to  ourself,  contrasted  so  strik 
ingly  as  in  this  instance  with  our  ideal.  Instead  of  a 
man  "  severe  and  stern  to  view,"  with  an  awe-inspiring 
countenance  in  every  hue  and  lineament  of  which  justice 
was  legibly  written,  and  whose  whole  demeanor  mani 
fested  a  fearful  amount  of  stiffness,  starch,  and  dignity, — 
in  short,  an  incarnation  of  law,  bristling  all  over  with 
technicalities  and  subtleties, —  a  walking  Coke  upon  Little 
ton, —  we  saw  before  us  a  sunny,  smiling  face  which 
bespoke  a  heart  full  of  kindness,  and  listened  to  a  voice 
whose  musical  tones  imparted  interest  to  everything  it 
communicated,  whether  dry  subtleties  of  the  law,  or 
reminiscences  of  the  "  giants  of  those  days  "  when  he  was 
a  practitioner  at  the  bar,  and  of  which  he  was  so  eloquent 
a  panegyrist. 

Further  acquaintance  deepened  our  first  impressions; 
we  found  that  he  was  the  counsellor,  guide,  philosopher, 
and  friend  of  all  his  pupils;  that,  without  the  slightest 
forfeiture  of  self-respect,  he  could  chat,  jest,  and  laugh 
with  all;  and  that  if  he  never  looked  the  Supreme  Court 
judge,  or  assumed  the  airs  of  a  Sir  Oracle,  it  was  simply 
5 


98  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

because  he  had  a  real  dignity,  an  inward  greatness  of 
soul,  which  rendered  it  needless  that  he  should  protect 
himself  from  intrusion  by  any  chevaux-de-frise  of  for 
malities, —  still  less  by  the  frizzled,  artificial  locks,  black 
robes,  and  portentous  seals  of  a  British  judge,  who,  with 
out  the  insignia  of  his  office,  would  almost  despise  himself. 
Overflowing  as  the  Judge  was  with  legal  lore,  which 
bubbled  up  as  from  a  perennial  fountain,  he  made  no 
display  of  learning;  in  this  matter,  as  in  the  other,  he 
never  led  one  to  suspect  the  absence  of  the  reality  by 
his  over-preciseness  and  niceness  about  the  shadow.  His 
pupil  did  not  pass  many  hours  in  his  presence  before  he 
learned,  too,  that  the  same  fertile  mind  that  could 
illumine  the  depths  of  constitutional  law,  and  solve  the 
knottiest  and  most  puzzling  problems  of  commercial 
jurisprudence,  could  also  enliven  the  monotony  of  recita 
tion  by  a  keen  witticism  or  a  sparkling  pun.  Though 
thirty  years  and  more  have  elapsed  since  the  time  of 
which  we  speak,  we  can  yet  see  him  in  fancy  as  plainly  as 
we  see  his  portrait  hanging  before  us.  It  is  two  o'clock 
P.M.;  he  walks  briskly  into  the  recitation-room,  his  face 
wreathed  with  smiles,  and,  laying  down  his  white  hat, 
takes  his  seat  at  the  table,  puts  on  his  spectacles,  and 
with  a  semi-quizzical  look  inquires,  as  he  glances  about 
the  room: 

"Where  do  I  begin  to-day?  Ah!  Mr.  L ,  I  believe 

you  dodged  out  yesterday  just  before  I  reached  you:  so 
we'll  begin  with  you." 

This  sally  provokes  a  laugh  in  which  the  Judge  joins 
as  heartily  as  the  students;  and  then  begins  perhaps  an 
examination  in  "Long  on  Sales,"  a  brief  treatise,  which 
suggests  the  remark  that  "Long  is  short,  and  short 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY.  99 

because   he   is   Long;    a  writer  who  can   condense  into  a 
small  book  what  others  would  spin  out  into  volumes.1' 

Probably  no  two  teachers  of  equal  ability  were  ever 
associated,  who  were  more  unlike  in  the  constitution  of 
their  minds,  and  who  conducted  a  recitation  in  modes 
more  dissimilar,  than  Judge  Story  and  Professor  Green- 
leaf.  The  latter,  the  beau  ideal  of  a  lawyer  in  his 
physique,  was  severe  and  searching  in  the  class-room, 
probing  the  student  to  the  quick,  accepting  no  half- 
answers,  or  vague,  general  statements  for  accurate 
replies,  showing  no  mercy  to  laziness;  and  when  he  com 
mented  on  the  text,  it  was  always  in  the  fewest  and 
pithiest  words  that  would  convey  the  ideas.  Language 
in  his  mouth  seemed  to  have  proclaimed  a  sumptuary 
law,  forbidding  that  it  should  in  any  case  overstep  the 
limits  of  the  thought.  Indolent  students,  who  had 
skimmed  over  the  lesson,  dreaded  his  scrutiny,  for  they 
knew  that  an  examination  by  him  was  a  literal  weighing 
of  their  knowledge  —  that  they  could  impose  on  him  by 
no  shams.  Judge  Story's  forte,  on  the  other  hand,  was 
in  lecturing,  not  in  questioning;  in  communicating  infor 
mation,  not  in  ascertaining  the  exact  sum  of  the  pupil's 
knowledge.  In  most  cases  his  questions  were  put  in  such 
a  way  as  to  suggest  the  answer:  for  example,  having 
stated  two  modes  of  legal  proceeding  under  certain 
circumstances,  he  would  ask  the  student — "Would  you 
adopt  the  former  course,  or  would  you  rather  adopt  the 
latter?"  "I  would  rather  adopt  the  latter,"  the  student 
would  reply,  who  perhaps  had  not  looked  at  the  lesson. 
"  You  are  right,"  would  be  the  comment  of  the  kind- 
hearted  Dane  Professor;  "Lord  Mansfield  himself  could 
not  have  answered  more  correctly."  Whether  he  was 


100  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE    STORY. 

too  good-natured  to  put  the  student  on  the  rack,  or 
thought  the  time  might  be  more  profitably  spent,  we 
know  not;  but  no  one  feared  to  recite  because  he  was 
utterly  ignorant  of  the  lesson. 

The  manner  of  the  Judge,  when  lecturing,  was  that 
of  an  enthusiast  rather  than  that  of  a  professional 
teacher.  The  recitation, —  if  recitation  it  could  be  called, 
where  the  professor  was  questioned  on  many  days  nearly 
as  often  as  the  student, —  was  not  confined  to  the  text 
book;  but  everything  that  could  throw  light  upon  the 
subject  in  hand, —  all  the  limitations  or  modifications  of 
the  principles  laid  down  by  the  author, —  were  fully 
stated,  and  illustrated  by  numerous  apt  examples.  The 
book  was  merely  the  starting-point,  whence  excursions 
were  made  into  all  the  cognate  provinces  of  the  law  from 
which  the  opima  spolia  of  a  keen  and  searching  intellect 
and  a  capacious  memory  could  be  gathered.  His  readi 
ness  of  invention,  as  his  son  has  remarked  in  the  biography 
of  his  father,  was  particularly  exhibited  in  the  facility 
and  exhaustless  ingenuity  with  which  he  supplied  ficti 
tious  cases  to  illustrate  a  principle,  and  shaped  the 
circumstances  so  as  to  expose  and  make  prominent  the 
various  exceptions  to  which  it  was  subject.  Often  his 
illustrations  were  drawn  from  incidents  of  the  day,  and 
the  listless  student  whose  ears  had  been  pricked  up  by 
some  amusing  tale  or  anecdote,  found  that  all  this  was 
but  the  gilding  of  the  pill,  and  that  he  had  been  cheated 
into  swallowing  a  large  dose  of  legal  wisdom.  Thus  "he 
attracted  the  mind  along  instead  of  driving  it.  Alive 
himself,  he  made  the  law  alive.  His  lectures  were  not 
bundles  of  dried  fagots,  but  of  budding  scions.  Like  the 
Chinese  juggler,  he  planted  the  seed,  and  made  it  grow 
before  the  eyes  of  his  pupils  into  a  tree." 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE    STORY.  101 

Few  men  have  ever  been  less  subject  to  moods.  He 
had  no  fits  of  enthusiasm.  Of  those  alternations  of  mental 
sunshine  and  gloom, —  of  buoyancy  and  depression, —  to 
which  most  men,  and  especially  men  of  genius,  are  sub 
ject,  he  seemed  to  know  nothing.  Nor  did  he,  even 
when  most  overwhelmed  with  work,  manifest  any  sense 
of  weariness.  After  having  tried  a  tedious  and  intricate 
case  in  the  United  States  Court  Room  in  Boston,  he  was 
as  fresh,  elastic,  and  vivacious  in  the  recitation  room  as 
if  he  had  taken  a  mountain  walk  or  some  other  bracing 
exercise.  He  had  that  rare  gift,  the  faculty  of  com 
municating,  and  loved,  above  all  things  else,  to  com 
municate  knowledge.  The  one  ruling  passion  of  his 
mind  was  what  a  French  writer  calls  "un  gout  dominant 
d'instruire  et  documenter  quelqu'un."  Few  men  with 
equal  stores  of  learning  have  had  a  more  perfect  com 
mand  of  their  acquisitions.  All  his  knowledge,  whether 
gathered  from  musty  black-letter  folios  or  from  modern 
octavos,  was  at  the  tip  of  his  tongue.  He  had  no 
unsmelted  gold  or  bullion,  but  kept  his  intellectual  riches 
in  the  form  of  current  coin,  as  negotiable  as  it  was 
valuable.  His  extraordinary  fluency,  his  vast  acquire 
ment,  his  sympathy  with  the  young,  and  especially  his 
personal  magnetism,  eminently  fitted  him  to  be  a  teacher. 
To  smooth  the  pathway  of  the  legal  learner,  to  give  him 
a  clue  by  which  to  thread  the  labyrinths  of  jurispru 
dence,  to  hold  a  torch  by  which  to  light  his  way  through 
its  dark  passages, —  above  all,  to  kindle  in  his  breast 
some  of  his  own  ever-burning  enthusiasm, —  was  to  the 
Judge  a  constant  joy.  We  doubt  if  ever  a  dull  hour 
was  known  in  his  lecture-room.  His  perennial  liveliness; 
his  frankness  and  abandon;  his  "  winning  smile,  that 


102  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

played  lambent  as  heat-lightning  around  his  varying 
countenance";  his  bubbling  hurnor;  his  contagious,  merry, 
and  irresistible  laugh;  his  exhaustless  fund  of  incident 
and  anecdote,  with  which  he  never  failed  to  give  piqu 
ancy  and  zest  to  the  driest  and  most  crabbed  themes, — 
all  won  not  only  the  attention,  but  the  love,  of  his 
pupils,  and  he  who  could  have  yawned  amid  such  stimu 
lants  to  attention,  must  have  been  dull  indeed.  Only  a 
dunce  or  a  beatified  intelligence  could  listen  uninterested 
to  such  a  teacher. 

So  prodigal  was  he  of  his  intellectual  riches,  so  lavish 
of  his  learning,  wit,  and  anecdote,  that  the  fear  of  every 
new-comer  was,  that  he  would  exhaust  himself;  but  the 
apprehension  was  soon  allayed;  the  stream  never  ceased, 
but  went  pouring  on  its  sparkling  waters  with  undimin- 
ished  volume,  till  the  hearer  felt  that  he  was  in  the 
condition  described  by  Robert  Hall  when  speaking  during 
his  lunacy  of  the  conversation  of  Mackintosh, — "  It  seemed 
like  the  Euphrates  pouring  into  a  teacup."  Of  all  the 
themes  which  Judge  Story  loved  to  discuss,  the  constitutional 
history  of  the  country  was  the  favorite.  When  lecturing 
upon  this  subject,  on  which  he  never  was  weary  of 
expatiating,  and  all  the  smallest  details  as  well  as  the 
grand  facts  of  which  were  at  the  tip  of  his  tongue,  his 
enthusiasm  and  eloquence  were  at  the  height.  Especially 
fond  was  he  at  such  times  of  describing  the  great  men 
of  other  days, —  the  Marshalls,  Pinkneys,  Dexters,  Martins, 
and  other  giants  of  the  law, —  whom  he  had  known  and 
associated  with;  and  of  holding  up  their  characters,  their 
Herculean  industry,  their  integrity,  and  other  virtues,  as 
models  to  be  imitated.  With  breathless  interest  we 
listened  as  he  spoke  of  the  principles  of  the  Constitution, 


KECOLLECTIOHS   OF   JUDGE   STOKY.  108 

' — the  views  of  the  great  men  by  whom  it  was  drawn, — 
of  the  dangers  to  which  the  country  was  exposed, —  of 
the  anxiety  with  which  the  experiment  of  a  republican 
government  was  watched  across  the  sea, —  and  closed  with 
an  exhortation  to  us  to  labor  for  the  promotion  of  justice, 
to  liberalize  and  expand  the  law,  to  scorn  all  trickery 
and  chicanery  in  its  practice,  and  to  deem  no  victory 
worth  winning  if  won  by  the  arts  of  the  trickster  and 
the  pettifogger. 

Few  of  the  old  graduates  of  Dane  Law  School  will 
forget  the  scene  that  occurred  on  his  return  from  the 
winter  session  of  the  Supreme  Court  at  Washington.  The 
announcement  of  his  return  was  sure  to  fill  the  lecture- 
room,  and  he  was  welcomed  with  all  the  joyousness,  and 
with  the  hearty  grasp  of  the  hand,  with  which  a  loving 
father  is  welcomed  home  by  his  children.  How  eagerly 
we  gathered  around  him,  and  plied  him  with  questions 
concerning  the  great  cases  that  had  been  argued  at  Wash 
ington,  and  with  what  kindling  enthusiasm  would  he 
describe  to  us  the  keen  contests  between  the  athletes  of 
the  bar,  as  one  would  have  described  to  a  company  of 
squires  and  pages, —  to  use  the  illustration  of  one  of  his 
pupils,  R.  H.  Dana, —  a  tournament  of  monarchs  and 
nobles  on  a  field  of  cloth  of  gold;  how  Webster  spoke  in 
this  case,  Legare,  or  Clay,  or  Crittenden,  or  Choate,  in  that, 
and  all  "  the  currents  of  the  heady  fight."  In  vain,  at 
any  such  times  as  we  have  described,  did  the  clock  peal  or 
the  bell  clang  the  hour  of  adjournment.  On  the  lecturer 
went,  oblivious  of  the  lapse  of  time,  pouring  forth  a  con 
tinuous  and  sparkling  stream  of  anecdote  and  reminiscence, 
or  throwing  "  a  light  as  from  a  painted  window  "  upon  the 
dark  passages  of  constitutional  history,  and  charming  the 


104  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

dullest  listener  by  his  eloquence,  till  the  bell  for  evening 
prayers  announced  that  now  he  must  cease,  and  his  hearers 
departed,  hoping  that  he  would  resume  the  broken  thread 
of  his  discourse  to-morrow.  Some  of  these  anecdotes  and 
reminiscences,  as  we  heard  them  from  his  lips,  with  a  few 
others  published  just  after  his  death  in  a  Boston  journal, 
will  make  up  the  rest  of  this  paper. 

Judge  Story  was  an  intimate  friend  and  warm  admirer 
of  William  Pinkney,  whom,  in  spite  of  his  dandyisms 
and  affectations,  he  regarded  as  one  of  the  ablest  and 
most  scholarly  lawyers  in  the  country.  Mr.  Pinkney,  said 
he,  dressed  always  with  fastidious  elegance,  and  looked  as 
if  he  had  just  come  from  his  dressing-room,  and  was 
going  to  a  fashionable  party.  His  coat,  of  the  finest  blue, 
was  nicely  brushed;  his  boots  shone  with  the  highest 
polish;  his  waistcoat,  of  immaculate ' whiteness,  glittered 
with  gold  buttons;  he  carried  in  his  hand  a  light  cane, 
with  which  he  played;  and  his  whole  appearance  was  that 
of  a  man  of  fashion  rather  than  that  of  a  profound  and 
laborious  lawyer.  He  was  exceedingly  ambitious,  fond  of 
admiration,  and  never  spoke  without  an  eye  to  effect.  He 
would  spend  weeks  of  hard  labor  upon  a  case,  and,  when 
it  was  called  up  for  trial,  would  beg  earnestly  to  have  it 
postponed  on  the  ground  that  he  had  had  no  time  for 
preparation;  and  when  informed  by  the  Court  that  it 
could  not  be  deferred  longer,  would  rise  and  astonish 
everybody  by  a  profound  and  elaborate  argument,  which 
he  wished  to  be  regarded  as  an  impromptu  burst  of  genius. 
Another  trick  of  his  was  to  quote  from  a  law-book  a 
passage  which  he  had  just  previously  read  and  got  by 
heart  for  the  very  occasion,  and  pretending  he  had  not 
seen  it  for  a  long  time,  but  had  no  doubt  of  its  tenor,  to 


KECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STOEY.  105 

cite  it  in  support  of  the  doctrine  he  had  maintained. 
The  counsel  on  the  other  side  would  perhaps  deny  the 
correctness  of  the  citation,  when  Mr.  Pinkney  would  call  for 
the  book,  and,  to  the  surprise  of  everybody,  would  read 
from  it  the  exact  words  he  had  quoted,  without  the  change 
of  a  syllable.  In  spite  of  these  affectations,  however,  he 
was  a  brilliant  and  powerful  lawyer,  a  fine  scholar,  and 
a  man  of  vast  resources;  and  if  in  the  contests  of  the 
forum  he  did  not  stand  confessed  as  facile  princeps, — the 
victor  of  every  contest, — yet  he  was  admitted  by  all  who 
witnessed  his  displays  to  be  surpassed  by  none  of  the 
athletes  with  whom  he  was  wont  to  wrestle  in  the  legal 
arena.  Nothing  could  be  more  logical  or  luminous  than 
his  reasoning;  his  very  statement  of  a  case  was  itself  an 
argument. 

Among  the  giants  of  the  bar, with  whom  Mr.  Pinkney 
was  accustomed  to  grapple,  continued  the  Judge,  was  the 
Irish  exile,  Thomas  Addis  Emmet.  "  I  shall  never  forget 
the  first  case  in  which  these  two  men  were  pitted  against 
each  other,  and  tested  each  other's  mettle.  It  was  a  case 
of  prize  law,  and  Mr.  Pinkney,  being  perfect  master  of  that 
branch  of  the  law,  in  which  his  antagonist  was  but  slightly 
versed,  and  having  the  advantage  moreover  of  being  at 
home  in  the  arena  to  which  Mr.  Emmet  was  a  stranger, 
gained  an  easy  victory,  and  not  content  with  that,  was 
somewhat  haughty  and  overbearing  in  his  manner,  as  he 
was  too  apt  to  be  when  he  lacked  a  foeman  worthy  of  his 
steel.  Stung  by  this  contemptuous  treatment,  Mr.  Emmet 
determined  to  supply  his  own  defects,  and,  for  the  next 
three  or  four  months,  devoted  himself  almost  exclusively  to 
the  study  of  that  department  of  the  law  in  which  he  had 
been  unable  to  cope  with  the  great  Marylander.  At  the 


106  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

end  of  that  time  he  was  employed  as  counsel  in  opposition 
to  Mr.  Pinkney,  in  the  famous  case  of  the  '  Nereide,1  on 
the  decision  of  which  depended  the  ownership  of  a  large 
and  very  valuable  cargo.  The  speech  of  Mr.  Emmet  on  this 
occasion  was  a  masterpiece  of  argument,  learning,  and 
eloquence,  and  placed  him  by  universal  consent  in  the  very 
front  rank  of  American  lawyers.  In  his  eloquent  exordium 
he  spoke  of  the  embarrassment  of  his  situation,  the  novelty 
of  the  forum,  and  the  deep  interest  which  the  public  took 
in  the  cause.  He  spoke  in  glowing  terms  of  the  genius  and 
accomplishments  of  his  opponent,  whose  fame  had  extended 
beyond  the  Atlantic;  and  then,  in  language  the  most  deli 
cate  and  touching,  he  alluded  to  the  contrast  presented  by 
his  own  life  to  this  brilliant  career, —  to  the  circumstances 
which  had  exiled  him  from  his  country, —  and  to  the  treat 
ment  he  had  received  from  Mr.  Pinkney  at  the  previous 
trial.  All  this  was  said  with  an  air  so  modest  and  in  terms 
so  full  of  pathos,  that  his  audience,  including  the  veteran 
attorneys  and  gray-headed  judges  of  the  Supreme  Court, 
were  moved  to  tears.  He  then  proceeded  to  his  argument, 
which  exhibited  a  profound  knowledge  and  a  firm  grasp  of 
the  law  applicable  to  the  case,  and  by  its  powerful  logic 
excited  the  admiration  of  both  bar  and  court.  Upon  his 
sitting  down,  Mr.  Pinkney  at  once  arose  and  prefaced  his 
argument, —  which,  I  need  not  say,  was  worthy  of  his 
abilities  and  fame, —  with  an  apology  for  his  former  unkind 
treatment  of  Mr.  Emmet,  couched  in  the  most  elegant  and 
polished  language,  surpassing  even  the  latter  in  pathos,  and 
breathing  sentiments  so  noble  and  magnanimous,  that  again 
the  entire  assembly, —  lawyers,  court,  and  spectators, — were 
moved  to  tears,  which  this  time  fell  more  plenteously  '  than 
from  Arabian  trees  their  medicinal  gums.'  When  the 


KECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STOEY.  107 

Court  adjourned,  I  asked  the  author  of  this  masterly 
and  eloquent  speech  if  he  would  not  write  out  the  sub 
stance  of  it,  so  far  as  he  could  recall  it, —  for  of  course  I 
<>ould  not  expect  him  to  give  me  the  exact  words  of  an 
exordium  thus  extemporized, —  and  let  me  have  a  copy. 
'  Come  with  me  to  dinner,1  was  the  reply,  '  and  we'll  talk 
about  the  matter.1  I  dined  with  him,  and  after  we  had 
risen  from  the  table,  he  drew  from  a  drawer  a  large  roll  of 
manuscript,  elegantly  written, —  for  he  wrote  a  beautiful 
hand, —  and  containing  his  entire  speech  word  for  word  as 
he  had  delivered  it,  not  only  the  argument,  but  the 
impromptu  exordium  which  had  so  charmed  and  affected 
all  who  heard  it!  The  truth  was,  that,  with  the  divining 
instinct  of  genius,  he  had  guessed  correctly  at  the  course 
which  his  adversary  would  pursue,  and  carefully  prepared 
himself  accordingly.11 

The  case  was  decided  adversely  to  Mr.  Pinkney's  client, 
Judge  Story  dissenting  from  the  opinion  of  the  other  mem 
bers  of  the  Court.  Scarcely,  however,  had  the  decision 
been  made,  when  intelligence  came  across  the  Atlantic  that 
Lord  Stowell,  the  head  of  the  Admiralty  Court  of  England, 
one  of  the  highest  authorities  in  maritime  law,  had,  in  a 
case  involving  precisely  the  same  principles  of  prize  law  as 
that  of  the  "  Nereide,11  made  a  decision  directly  the  opposite 
to  that  of  the  United  States  Supreme  Court.  With  the  men 
tion  of  this  fact,  so  gratifying  to  his  pride  of  opinion,  Judge 
Story  triumphantly  closed  his  narration. 

At  another  time  Judge  Story  told  the  following  anecdote 
of  Samuel  Dexter,  Fisher  Ames,  and  Chief  Justice  Marshall. 
"  Mr.  Dexter  was  a  remarkable  man, —  a  man  whom,  to  use 
Burke's  language,  if  you  should  meet  and  talk  with  him  a 
few  minutes  on  a  rainy  day  under  a  shed,  you  would  at 


108  RECOLLECTIONS   OF  JUDGE   STORY. 

once  pronounce  a  great  man.  The  first  time  I  met  him  I 
knew  not  who  he  was,  and  stared  in  wonderment.  Yet  his 
was  rather  a  brilliant  mind  than  a  truly  great  one.  Mr. 
Dexter  was  once  in  company  with  Fisher  Ames  and  Chief 
Justice  Marshall,  when  the  latter  began  a  conversation,  or 
rather  a  monologue,  which  lasted  some  three  hours.  On 
their  way  homeward,  Ames  and  Dexter  vied  with  each  other 
in  extolling  the  learning  and  mental  grasp  of  their  host. 
After  a  brief  walk,  Ames  said :  '  To  tell  the  truth,  Dexter, 
I  have  not  understood  a  word  of  his  argument  for  half  an 
hour.'  '  And  I,'  as  frankly  responded  Dexter,  '  have  been 
out  of  my  depth  for  an  hour  and  a  half.' " 

Judge  Story  was  an  ardent  admirer  of  Albert  Gallatin, 
whom  he  ranked  as  the  peer  of  Alexander  Hamilton.  Both 
of  these  gentlemen,  he  observed,  were  foreigners,  and  they 
landed  on  our  shores  about  the  same  time.  "  When,  as 
Secretary  of  the  Treasury  under  Mr.  Jefferson,  Mr.  Gallatin 
succeeded  to  Mr.  Hamilton,  he  made  no  changes,  though  the 
latter  belonged  to  the  opposing  party.  Unlike  the  Italian 
on  whose  tombstone  was  inscribed  the  significant  epitaph, 
'  I  was  well,  I  wished  to  be  better,  and  I  am  here,'  he  did 
not  try  to  improve  upon  that  which  was  good.  When  Mr. 
Gallatin  was  a  member  of  Congress,  he  said  to  me  one  day: 
'We  have  plenty  of  eloquence  upon  the  floor, —  aye,  and 
too  much!  It  is  the  hard-working  committee-man  who  is 
needed;  the  man  who  rarely  speaks,  but  who  can  apply 
himself  to  hard,  dry,  yet  important  statistical  labor. 
Figures  of  this  kind  are  far  weightier  and  more  useful 
than  figures  of  speech.'  If  this  was  true  in  the  days 
of  Mr.  Gallatin,  what  is  the  fact  now?" 

The  haste  and  recklessness  with  which  laws  are  made 
and  repealed  in  this  country,  was  a  frequent  topic  of  the 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY.  109 

Judge's  denunciation.  He  once  asked  an  eminent  gentle 
man  from  Tennessee  why  the  legislature  of  that  State  did 
not  meet  annually,  as  did  the  legislatures  of  other  States. 
The  reply  was,  "  that  the  laws  might  have  at  least  a  trial 
before  they  were  repealed," — a  sarcasm  not  more  pointed 
than  just. 

Judge  Story  accounted  for  the  provision  in  the  United 
States  Constitution  requiring  that  a  person  be  thirty-five 
years  of  age  to  render  him  eligible  to  the  office  of  Senator, 
by  the  fact  that  the  framers  of  that  instrument  were  very 
distrustful  of  young  men.  "  He  is  not  yet  fifty  years  old," 
was  an  argument  which  annihilated  a  canvasser's  preten 
sions.  "  Some  of  the  ablest  statesmen,  however,  that  the 
world  has  seen,  were  young  men;  for  example,  Fox,  and 
Pitt,  who  at  twenty-three  was  by  far  the  ablest  man  in 
Parliament.  I  am  aware  that  I  go  counter  to  the  judgment 
of  many  when  I  pronounce  William  Pitt  an  incomparably 
greater  man  than  his  father,  Lord  Chatham,  a  man  who 
was  often  strangely  inconsistent.  You  all  remember  his 
eloquent  denunciation  of  the  lord  who  recommended  the 
employment  of  the  Indians  against  the  Americans  in  the 
war  of  the  Revolution;  and  yet  the  man  from  whose  lips 
fell  this  burst  of  indignation  filed  in  the  British  Cabinet  a 
letter  in  his  own  handwriting  advising  the  very  measure 
which,  when  urged  by  another,  he  characterizes  as  in 
famous  ! " 

Judge  Story  was  a  profound  admirer  of  Chief  Justice 
Marshall,  and  could  rarely  hear  his  name  mentioned  with 
out  digressing  to  panegyrize  his  learning  and  intellectual 
power.  "  Marshall's  favorite  expression,  said  he,  was  '  It  is 
admitted.'  So  resistless  was  his  logic,  that  it  was  a  com 
mon  remark  of  the  bar,  that  if  you  once  admitted  his 


110  RECOLLECTIONS   OF  JUDGE   STORY. 

premises,  it  was  all  over  with  you.  You  were  forced  to  his 
conclusions;  and  the  only  safety,  therefore,  was  in  denying 
everything  he  asserted.  Daniel  Webster  once  said  to  me, — 
*  When  Judge  Marshall  says,  It  is  admitted,  sir,  I  am 
preparing  for  a  bomb  to  burst  over  my  head,  and  demolish 
all  my  points.' " 

"  Some  years  ago,"  remarked  the  Judge,  "  I  saw  a  book 
advertised,  entitled  '  New  Views  of  the  Constitution.'  I 
was  startled.  What  right  has  a  man  to  announce  new 
views  upon  this  subject?  Speculations  upon  our  govern 
ment  are  dangerous,  and  should  be  frowned  upon.  That 
great  statesman,  Edmund  Burke,  has  wisely  and  senten- 
tiously  said, — '  Governments  are  practical  things,  not  toys 
for  speculists  to  play  with.'  And  yet  governments  must 
often  change,  to  meet  the  demands  of  the  times.  I  have 
been  in  public  life  nearly  forty  years,  and  have  seen  great 
changes  in  the  country.  Men  may  flatter  themselves  that 
now,  at  least,  all  is  settled;  but  no!  our  laws  are  written 
upon  the  sands  of  time,  and  the  winds  of  popular  opinion 
gradually  efface  them;  new  layers  are  to  be  made,  and 
your  old  writing  renewed  or  changed." 

The  following  statement  was  made  by  the  Judge  to 
illustrate  the  extreme  difficulty  of  framing  statutes  so  as 
to  avoid  all  ambiguity  in  their  language.  Being  once 
employed  by  Congress  to  draft  an  important  law,  he  spent 
six  months  in  trying  to  perfect  its  phraseology,  so  that  its 
sense  would  be  clear  beyond  the  shadow  of  a  doubt,  and  not 
the  smallest  loophole  could  be  found  for  a  lawyer  to  creep 
through.  And  yet,  in  less  than  a  year  afterward,  after 
having  heard  the  arguments  of  two  able  attorneys,  he  was 
utterly  unable,  in  a  suit  which  came  before  him  as  a 
Judge  of  the  Supreme  Court,  to  decide  upon  the  statute's 
meaning. 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE    STORY.  Ill 

Being  asked  one  day  whether  John  Tyler  was  President 
or  Acting  President  of  the  United  States  at  the  demise  of 
President  Harrison,  Judge  Story  replied:  "A  nice  question, 
gentlemen,  and  hard  to  solve.  The  question  was  debated 
in  Cabinet  meeting;  but,  on  Mr.  Webster's  opinion,  Mr. 
Tyler  was  addressed  as  President.  On  one  occasion,  when 
Chief  Justice  Taney,  of  the  Supreme  Court,  was  ill,  I  took 
his  place  as  Chief  Justice,  and  was  thus  addressed.  At 
first  I  felt  nervous;  but  soon  becoming  used  to  it,  I  found 
it,  like  public  money  to  new  members  of  Congress,  '  not  bad 
to  take.'  And  this  was  probably  the  feeling  of  Mr.  Tyler." 

Judge  Story  was  fond  of  telling  that  Mr.  Webster,  on 
one  or  two  occasions,  after  grumbling  at  a  legal  decision 
of  the  former,  had  afterwards  the  magnanimity  to  ac 
knowledge  that  he  was  wrong.  We  are  sure  that  when  the 
Judge  himself  was  in  error,  he  was  frank,  on  discovering 
it,  to  avow  the  fact.  One  day  in  the  Moot  Court,  a 
student,  arguing  a  case  before  him,  said:  "My  next  authori 
ty  will  be  one  which  your  Honor  will  not  be  disposed  to 
question, —  a  decision  by  Mr.  Justice  Story,  of  the  United 
States  Supreme  Court.'1  "I  beg  your  pardon,"  said  the 
Judge,  bowing;  "but  that  opinion  by  Mr.  Justice  Story 
is  not  law." 

It  was  well  observed  by  Charles  Sumner,  in  his  eulogy 
on  Judge  Story,  that  any  just  estimate  of  the  man  and 
his  works  must  have  regard  to  his  three  different  char 
acters, —  as  a  judge,  as  an  author,  and  as  a  teacher. 
When  we  look  at  his  books  only,  we  are  astonished  at 
his  colossal  industry:  it  seems  almost  incredible  that  a 
single  mind,  in  a  single  life,  should  have  been  able  to 
accomplish  so  much.  His  written  judgments  on  his  own 
circuit,  and  his  various  commentaries,  occupy  twenty-seven 


112  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

volumes,  and  his  judgments  in  the  Supreme  Court  of  the 
United  States  form  an  important  part  of  thirty-four 
volumes.  Rightly  does  Mr.  Sumner  characterize  him  as 
the  Lope  de  Vega,  or  the  Walter  Scott,  of  the  Common 
Law.  With  far  more  truth  might  it  be  said  of  him 
than  was  said  by  Dryden  of  one  of  the  greatest  British 
lawyers : 

"Our  law  that  did  a  boundless  ocean  seem, 
Was  coasted  all  and  fathomed  all  by  him." 

Besides  all  his  legal  labors,  he  delivered  many  discourses 
on  literary  and  scientific  subjects,  wrote  many  biographi 
cal  sketches  of  his  contemporaries,  elaborate  reviews  for 
the  "North  American,"  drew  up  learned  memorials  to 
Congress,  made  long  speeches  in  the  Massachusetts  Legis 
lature,  contributed  largely  to  the  "  Encyclopaedia  Ameri 
cana,"  prepared  Reports  on  Codification,  etc.,  and  drafted 
some  of  the  most  important  Acts  of  Congress.  The  secret 
of  these  vast  achievements  was  ceaseless,  methodical  in 
dustry,  frequent  change  of  labor,  and  concentration  of 
mind.  He  economized  odd  moments,  bits  and  fragments 
of  time,  never  overworked,  and,  when  he  worked,  con 
centrated  upon  the  subject  all  the  powers  of  his  intellect. 
Add  to  this,  that  his  knowledge  did  not  lie  in  undigested 
heaps  in  his  mind,  but  was  thoroughly  assimilated,  so  as 
to  become  a  part  of  his  mental  constitution.  His  brain 
was  a  vast  repository  of  legal  facts  and  principles,  each 
one  of  which  had  its  cell  or  pigeon-hole,  from  which  it 
was  always  forthcoming  the  instant  it  was  wanted. 

No  other  American  lawyer  or  jurist  has  so  wide-spread 
a  European  fame.  His  legal  works,  republished  in  Eng 
land,  are  recognized  as  of  the  highest  authority  in  all 
the  courts  of  that  country;  and  his  "Conflict  of  Laws," 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY.  113 

—  embodying  the  essence  of  all  similar  works,  as  well 
as  the  fruits  of  his  own  deep  thinking,  —  a  work  of 
enormous  labor,  upon  a  most  intricate  and  perplexing 
theme, —  has  been  translated  into  many  European  lan 
guages,  and  is  cited  as  the  most  exhaustive  discussion 
of  the  subject.  Yet, —  such  is  fame, —  this  man  whose 
name  had  crossed  the  Atlantic,  and  was  on  the  lips  of 
the  profoundest  jurists  of  the  Old  World,  had  com 
paratively  little  reputation  in  his  lifetime  among  his 
own  countrymen.  Men  immeasurably  inferior  to  him, 
intellectually  and  morally,  overshadowed  him  in  the  pub 
lic  mind.  And  yet  no  man  was  more  susceptible  to 
merited  praise  than  he.  While  he  despised  flattery,  and 
could  detect  the  least  taint  of  it  with  the  quickness  of 
an  instinct,  his  heart  was  yet  as  fresh  and  tender  as  a 
child's,  and  he  felt  neglect  as  keenly  as  the  bud  the 
frost.  Not  soon  shall  we  forget  the  good  humor,  mingled 
with  a  sensibility  that  could  not  be  concealed,  with  which 
he  told  the  following  story  of  himself,  illustrating  the 
saying  that  "  a  prophet  is  not  without  honor,  save  in  his 
own  country  " : 

"  One  day  I  was  called  suddenly  to  Boston,  to  attend 
to  some  business  matters,  and  on  my  way  thither  I  dis 
covered  that  I  had  forgotten  my  pocket-book.  It  was  too 
late  to  return,  and  so  when  the  omnibus  halted  at  the 
Port  (Cambridgeport,  half-way  between  Old  Cambridge, 
the  Judge's  residence,  and  Boston,)  I  ran  hastily  into  the 
neighboring  bank,  and  asked  to  be  accommodated  with  a 
hundred  dollars.  The  cashier  stared  at  me  as  if  he 
thought  me  insane;  but  I  noticed  that  he  particularly 
scrutinized  my  feet;  and  then  he  coldly  informed  me 
that  he  had  not  the  pleasure  of  recognizing  me.  I  imme- 


114  RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY. 

diately  told  him  my  name,  supposing  that  it  might  have 
reached,  at  least,  the  limits  of  my  own  place  of  residence. 
He  still  kept  his  eyes  upon  my  feet,  and  finally,  as  I 
was  about  to  leave,  more  chagrined  than  disappointed, 
he  requested  me  to  step  back,  adding  that  he  would  be 
pleased  to  accommodate  me.  Upon  my  inquiring  the 
reason  of  his  delay,  he  replied :  '  Sir,  I  have  never  heard 
your  name  before,  but  I  know  you  must  be  a  gentleman 
from  the  looks  of  your  boots.'  "  The  unction  and  perfect 
good  humor  with  which  the  Judge  told  this  anecdote, 
and  the  joyous  laugh  with  which  he  concluded  it, —  aside 
from  the  absurdity  that  such  a  man  should  be  judged  of 
by  his  material  understanding, —  were  irresistible.  We 
need  not  add,  that  his  pupils  laughed,  as  Falstaff  saysr 
"  without  intervellums," —  till  their  faces  were  "  like  a 
wet  cloak  ill  laid  up." 

We  have  spoken  of  Judge  Story's  wit.  Like  Cicero, 
Burke,  Erskine,  and  many  other  great  lawyers,  he  loved 
a  keen  witticism,  and  did  not  consider  it  beneath  his 
dignity  to  perpetrate  a  telling  pun.  Once  at  a  Phi  Beta 
Kappa  dinner,  Edward  Everett,  then  Governor  of  Massa 
chusetts,  gave  as  a  toast:  "The  legal  profession:  however 
high  its  other  members  may  climb,  they  can  never  rise 
higher  than  one  Story."  The  shouts  of  applause  which 
greeted  this  sally  were  redoubled  when  Judge  Story  jumped 
up  and  responded  with  the  following:  "Fame  follows 
applause  where-mr  it  (Everett)  goes.11 

We  doubt  if  any  teacher  ever  loved  his  pupils  more 
deeply,  or  was  more  universally  loved  by  them,  than  the 
subject  of  this  article.  In  the  success  of  his  "boys,1'  as 
he  called  them,  both  at  the  school  and  in  their  after  life, 
he  felt  a  profound  interest;  their  triumphs  were  his  tri- 


RECOLLECTIONS   OF   JUDGE   STORY.  115 

amphs,  and  their  failures  caused  him  the  keenest  pain. 
The  tact  with  which  he  adapted  himself  to  the  various 
temperaments  and  idiosyncrasies  of  his  pupils,  and  the 
patience  with  which  he  bore  any  one's  dullness,  were  also 
remarkable.  We  remember  that  one  day  a  somewhat 
eccentric  and  outspoken  student  from  Tennessee  came  to 
the  Judge  in  the  library  of  the  Law  School,  and  holding 
up  an  old  folio,  said:  "Judge,  what  do  you  understand 
by  this  here  Rule  in  Shelley's  Case?  I've  been  studying 
it  three  days,  and  can't  make  anything  of  it."  "  Shelley's 
Case!  Shelley's  Case!"  exclaimed  the  Judge,  with  a  look 
of  astonishment,  as  he  took  the  volume  and  held  it  up 
before  his  eyes, — "  Do  you  expect  to  understand  that  in 
three  days?  Why,  it  took  me  three  weeks!" 

One  of  the  hobbies  of  Judge  Story  was  the  great 
blessings  conferred  on  society  by  Courts  of  Equity,  in 
remedying  the  defects  of  the  Common  Law.  A  favorite 
way  of  exposing  these  defects,  was  to  put  a  case  in  which 
the  inadequacy  of  the  latter  was  strikingly  apparent,  and 
then  naively  ask  the  student:  "Does  it  occur  to  you, 

Mr.  ,  where  your  remedy  in  such  a  case  would  lie?" 

The  invariable  answer,  "  In  a  Court  of  Equity,  Sir,"  was 
so  often  repeated  that  it  always  provoked  a  smile  from 
the  students.  Like  many  eminent  men,  Judge  Story  had 
his  pet  quotations,  anecdotes,  and  maxims,  which  he  never 
wearied  of  repeating.  Few  of  his  living  pupils  can  have 
forgotten  the  favorite  "  Causa  proxima,  non  remold  spec- 
tatur"  or  the  oft-cited  aphorism  of  Rochefoucauld,  "  There 
is  always  something  in  the  misfortunes  of  our  best  friends 
which  does  not  displease  us," —  which  must  have  impressed 
itself  on  the  Judge's  memory  simply  because  in  his  nature 
there  was  not  the  slightest  tincture  of  the  cynicism  which 
tae  sentiment  expresses. 


116  RECOLLECTIONS   OF  JUDGE    STORY. 

When  a  young  lawyer,  Judge  Story  published  a  volume 
entitled  "Solitude,  and  other  Poems" — a  literary  venture 
which  he  deeply  regretted  in  after  life.  Most  of  the  pieces 
were  of  the  kind  which  "  neither  men,  gods,  nor  booksellers' 
columns  can  endure,"  and  the  dedication  began, — 

"Maid  of  my  heart,  to  thee  I  string  my  lyre." 

Of  this  production  few  copies  are  extant, —  the  author 
having  bought  up  and  destroyed  all  he  could  find.  There 
are  two  copies  in  Harvard  College  Library.  He  also  pub 
lished  a  Fourth-of-July  oration,  which  contained  about 
the  average  number  of  "spread-eagles."  The  ease  with 
which  he  rhymed  is  well  illustrated  by  the  following 
verses.  Chancing  to  step  into  the  office  of  the  Salem 
"Register,"  just  as  the  first  number  was  about  to  be 
issued,  he  was  asked  by  the  editor  to  write  a  motto  for 
that  newspaper.  Taking  a  pen,  young  Story  dashed  off 
the  following  impromptu: 

"Here  shall  the  press  the  people's  rights  maintain, 
Unawed  by  influence,  and  unbribed  by  gain: 
Here  patriot  truth  her  glorious  precepts  draw, 
Pledged  to  religion,  liberty,  and  law." 

During  the  lifetime  of  Judge  Story,  a  volume  of  "  Mis 
cellanies  "  from  his  pen  was  published,  containing  his 
literary  orations,  contributions  to  reviews,  and  his  beauti 
ful  address  at  the  consecration  of  Mount  Auburn  Ceme 
tery.  There,  under  the  trees  that  overshadow  the  lovely 
dell  in  which  he  spoke,  lie  his  remains;  and  in  the 
chapel,  near  the  entrance  to  this  home  of  the  dead, 
stands  a  marble  statue  of  the  great  jurist,  executed  by 
his  son,  W.  W.  Story,  the  sculptor  and  poet, —  an  exqui 
site  work  of  art,  in  which  all  the  characteristic  qualities 
of  the  original  are  idealized,  yet  most  faithfully  repro 
duced  and  preserved. 


MORAL  GRAHAMISM. 


~1\ /T"ANY  of  our  readers  doubtless  remember  Sylvester 
**"*-*-  Graham,  the  great  originator  and  expounder  of  the 
bran-bread  system  of  diet,  and  his  theories.  They  remem 
ber  how  eloquently  he  inveighed  against  the  consumption 
of  animal  food,  and  how  he  startled  all  the  old  ladies,  both 
male  and  female,  throughout  the  length  and  breadth  of  the 
land,  by  telling  them  that  tea  was  a  slow  poison,  which 
would  infallibly  shorten  their  lives.  It  is  said  that  one 
venerable  old  lady,  who  had  entered  upon  her  ninety-second 
year,  abandoned  with  horror  the  delicious  beverage,  re 
solved  never  to  touch  "  the  pizen  "  again,  lest  she  should 
not  live  out  half  of  her  days.  Many  was  the  stout  Falstaff 
that  pined  away  to  a  skeleton  under  the  Graham  regimen. 
Eobustious,  corpulent  fellows, —  perfect  Daniel  Lamberts 
in  ponderosity, —  who  had  trundled  along  a  mountain  of 
flesh  before  trying  a  pea-soup  diet,  were  suddenly  reduced 
so  thin  as  hardly  to  have  weight  enough  to  turn  a  money- 
scale,  or  opaqueness  to  cast  a  shadow.  Horace  Greeley 
came  near  being  reduced  to  a  "  dried  neat's  tongue,  a  mere 
dagger  of  lath,1'  or  second  Calvin  Edson,  by  the  experiment. 
At  one  time  Graham  had  some  ten  thousand  or  more  disci 
ples  in  this  country,  who  not  only  were  the  sworn  foes  of 
beef,  pork  and  mutton,  but  denounced  Mocha  and  old  Gov 
ernment  Java,  scorned  even  Dr.  Parr's  compromise  con- 


118  MORAL   GRAHAMISM. 

cerning  tea, — "  non  possum  tecum  vivere,  nee  sine  te"  — 
and  declared,  with  Hood,  that 

"If  wine  ie  a  poison,  eo  is  tea, 

Only  in  another  shape; 
What  matter  if  one  die 

By  canister  or  grape? 

• 

By  long  searching,  Graham  might  now,  if  alive,  muster 
a  baker's  dozen  of  followers;  but  probably,  if  they  were 
marshaled,  he  would  exclaim,  with  Falstaff,  "  I'll  not  march 
through  Coventry  with  them,  that's  flat.  Nay,  and  the 
villains  march  wide  betwixt  the  legs,  as  if  they  had  gyves 
on." 

Now,  just  as  there  are  Grahamites  who  think  that,  be 
cause  they  are  virtuous,  there  shall  be  "  no  more  cakes  and 
ale," — living  skeletons,  who 

"  defy 

That  which  they  love  most  tenderly; 
Quarrel  with  minced  pie,  and  disparage 
Their  best  and  dearest  friend,  plum-porridge; 
Fat  ox  and  goose  itself  oppose, 
And  blaspheme  custard  through  the  nose,"  — 

so  there  are  moral  Grahamites,  too.  They  have  a  certain 
course  of  mental  dietetics,  which  they  declare  to  be  most 
conducive  to  the  welfare  of  man,  the  microcosm,  in  his 
relations  to  the  macrocosm.  The  moral  Grahamites  are 
the  men  who  set  their  faces  against  the  higher  and  more 
difficult  branches  of  education  taught  in  our  colleges;  who 
prefer  the  wholesome  bran-bread  of  the  practical  sciences 
to  the  roast-beef  and  plum-pudding  of  scholastic  lore.  Give 
us,  they  say,  the  man  who  makes  a  new  mowing-machine, 
or  a  Hobbs-defying,  burglar-proof  lock,  harder  to  be  opened 
than  the  riddle  of  the  Egyptian  sphinx;  give  us  the  man 
who  can  construct  a  tunnel  under  Lake  Michigan, —  who 
cnn  build  a  railroad  across  the  Rocky  Mountains,  or  a  first- 


MORAL   GRAHAMISM.  110 

rate  steamship.  Such  men  are  the  great  benefactors  and 
movers  of  the  world.  The  poet  Longfellow,  who  makes 
Golden  Legends;  his  neighbor,  Winlock,  who  scoops  up 
new  asteroids  from  the  depths  of  space;  Powers,  who 
carves  statues  in  marble;  Bierstadt,  who  transports  us 
amid  the  marvels  of  the  Yosemite;  Whitney,  who  detects 
the  affinities  of  remote  languages,  and  Emerson,  who  culti 
vates  divine  philosophy, —  find  little  favor  with  our  Gra- 
hamites.  Look,  they  say,  at  Pullman  and  his  palace  res 
taurant  cars,  and  at  Donald  McKay  and  his  big  ships! 
Donald  is  the  greatest  man  on  our  seaboard.  And  cer 
tainly,  if  Providence  intended  that  shipbuilding  should  be 
the  end  of  our  creation,  he  would  be  greater  than  Soc 
rates  or  Plato,  Shakspeare  or  Milton,  and  only  equaled  by 
Yanderbilt,  James  Fisk,  Jr.,  or  the  late  filibustering,  law 
less  George  Law. 

But  what  is  this  "  practical "  education  for  which  so 
many  persons  are  clamoring?  Are  there  any  two  persons 
among  them  who  can  agree  as  to  what  it  is?  If  by  prac 
tical  education  is  meant  that  minimum  of  training  and 
teaching  which  will  just  enable  a  man  to  house,  clothe  and 
feed  himself, —  to  pay  his  bills  and  keep  clear  of  the  poor- 
house,  which  is  summed  up  in  the  three  R's,  "  Readin', 
Ritin'  and  Rithmetic," —  then  we  deny  that  such  an  educa 
tion  subserves,  in  the  highest  degree,  even  its  own  petty 
and  selfish  ends.  The  wretched  economy  which  tries  to  sift 
the  so-called  practical  from  the  true,  the  good,  and  the 
beautiful,  fails  to  get  even  the  good  it  covets.  But  the 
most  popular  idea  of  a  practical  education  is  that  which 
regards  it  as  a  training  for  a  particular  calling  or  profes 
sion.  Our  colleges  are  begged  to  treat  Smith's  son  as  an 
incipient  tape-seller,  Brown's  as  an  undeveloped  broker, 


120  MORAL   GRAHAMISM. 

Thompson's  as  an  embryo  engineer,  and  Jones's  as  a  bud 
ding  attorney.  Well,  we  admit  to  the  fullest  extent  the 
right  of  Smith,  Brown,  Thompson,  and  Jones,  juniors,  to 
qualify  themselves  for  any  occupation  they  choose ;  but  we 
deny  their  right  to  demand  of  the  State  or  of  our  colleges 
a  special  training  which  shall  qualify  them  for  buying 
calico,  building  bridges,  drawing  declarations,  or  speculat 
ing  in  stocks.  Young  men  demand  an  education  which  shall 
make  them  good  merchants,  lawyers,  and  carpenters;  but 
they  need  first  of  all,  and  more  imperiously  than  all  things 
else,  to  be  educated  as  men. 

Of  a  piece  of  timber  you  may  make  a  mast,  a  machine, 
a  piano,  or  a  pulpit ;  but,  first  of  all,  it  must  become  timber, 
sound,  solid,  and  well  seasoned.  The  highest  and  truest 
education  is  not  that  which  develops,  trains,  and  strength 
ens  this  or  that  faculty,  but  that  which  vitalizes  and  stimu 
lates  all  the  faculties;  which  does  for  the  mind  what  the 
gymnasium  does  for  the  body, —  energizes  it  by  robust  and 
bracing  exercises.  Whatever  does  this  most  effectually, — 
whatever  makes  the  mind  of  the  pupil  conscious  of  its  own 
energies,  and  gives  it  the  power  of  rightly  using  them, —  is 
the  very  thing  he  needs,  however  little  use  he  may  have  for 
it  after  the  drill  is  over.  The  thing  he  is  taught, —  the 
lesson  learned, —  is  not  the  end,  but  the  means  of  education. 
There  can  be  no  greater  mistake  made,  than  to  suppose  that 
a  man  is  losing  his  time,  unless  he  is  learning  something 
which  can  be  turned  to  immediate  account  in  the  calling 
to  which  he  is  destined.  Professor  Maiden,  in  a  lecture  on 
the  "  Introduction  of  the  Natural  Sciences  into  General 
Education,'1  has  so  ably  exposed  this  fallacy,  that  we  cannot 
help  quoting  the  passage.  In  speaking  of  the  demand  made 
by  some  parents  that  education  should  have  a  direct  relation 


MORAL    GRAHAMISM.  121 

to  gainful  pursuits, —  that,  for  example,  a  boy  who  is  to 
spend  his  days  among  figures  and  calculations,  in  buying  or 
in  selling,  in  constructing  engines  or  in  navigating  ships, 
should  not  "  waste  his  time  "  in  mastering  Greek  or  Latin, 
the  writer  says: 

"  If  the  education  of  the  body  were  the  matter  in  ques 
tion,  instead  of  the  education  of  the  mind,  the  absurdity  of 
this  conduct  would  be  abundantly  manifest.  Put  the  case 
of  a  boy  of  a  weakly  constitution  and  effeminate  habits ;  and 
suppose  that  family  connections  and  interest  make  it  seem 
desirable  that  he  should  enter  the  army,  and  that  he  is 
committed  to  the  care  of  some  one, —  an  old  soldier,  if  you 
like, —  who  professes  to  prepare  him  for  his  military  career. 
At  the  end  of  four  or  five  years,  when  he  ought  to  obtain 
his  commission,  his  father  may  think  it  right  to  inquire 
into  his  fitness  for  his  profession.  '  Have  you  studied 
tactics?1  '  No,  sir.1  'Have  you  studied  gunnery?1  'No, 
sir.1  '  Are  you  perfect  in  the  last  instructions  issued  from 
the  Horse  Guards  for  the  manoeuvres  of  cavalry?1  '  I  have 
not  seen  them,  sir.1  '  Have  you  learned  the  broad-sword 
exercise?'  'No.1  'Can  you.  put  a  company  of  infantry 
through  their  drill  ?'  'No.1  '  Have  you  practiced  platoon 
firing?1  '  No.1  '  Can  you  even  fix  a  bayonet  in  a  musket?1 
'  I  have  never  tried,  sir.1  After  such  an  examination,  we 
may  suppose  the  father  expostulating  indignantly  with  the 
veteran  under  whose  care  his  son  had  been  placed.  The 
latter  might  reply :  '  Sir,  when  you  entrusted  your  son  to 
my  training,  he  was  weak  and  sickly ;  he  had  little  appetite, 
and  was  fastidious  in  his  eating ;  he  could"  bear  no  exposure 
to  the  weather;  he  could  not  walk  two  miles  without 
fatigue;  he  was  incapable  of  any  severer  exercise;  he  was 
unwilling,  and  indeed  unable,  to  join  in  the  athletic  sports 
6 


122  MOKAL   GRAHAMISM. 

of  boys  of  his  age.  Now  he  is  in  perfect  health,  and  wants 
and  wishes  for  no  indulgence;  he  can  make  a  hearty  dinner 
on  any  wholesome  food,  or  go  without  it,  if  need  be;  he 
will  get  wet  through,  and  care  nothing  about  it;  he  can 
walk  twelve  or  fifteen  miles  a  day;  he  can  ride;  he  can 
swim;  he  can  skate;  he  can  play  a  game  at  cricket,  and 
enjoy  it;  though  he  has  not  learnt  the  broad -sword  exer 
cise,  he  fences  well;  though  he  has  never  handled  a  soldier's 
musket,  he  is  an  excellent  shot  with  a  fowling-piece;  he  has 
a  firm  foot,  a  quick  eye,  and  a  steady  hand;  he  is  a  very 
pretty  draughtsman;  he  is  eager  to  enter  his  profession; 
and  you  may  take  my  word  for  it,  sir,  he  will  make  a  brave 
and  active  officer.' " 

Was  ever  a  method  of  training  more  triumphantly  vin 
dicated?  The  principle  upon  which  the  veteran  rests  his 
argument  is,  that  by  his  system  he  has  invigorated  the 
physical  constitution  of  his  pupil,  and  so  has  fitted  him  for 
any  profession  in  which  habits  of  activity  or  of  endurance 
may  be  required, —  a  principle  which  is  equally  sound  when 
applied  to  the  discipline  of  the  mind.  In  the  ancient  gym 
nasium,  the  first  end  sought  was  to  produce  a  muscular 
man,  an  athlete.  When  this  was  accomplished,  it  mattered 
little  whether  he  entered  the  lists  of  the  wrestler,  or  of  the 
boxer,  or  of  the  racer.  The  first  and  most  indispensable 
requisite  to  success  in  any  calling  above  that  of  a  day- 
laborer,  is  mental  vigor.  A  man  may  have  a  head  crammed 
with  information;  he  may  be  a  walking  encyclopaedia  of 
facts  and  opinions,  of  dates  and  statistics  on  this  subject 
and  that;  but  without  intellectual  force,  a  trained  and 
athletic  mind,  he  is  little  better  than  the  case  that  contains 
the  books  from  which  his  knowledge  has  been  drawn.  The 
man  who  has  had  a  special  training,  directed  with  exclusive 


MORAL   GRAHAMISM.  123 

reference  to  a  particular  pursuit,  may  be  well  instructed, 
but  in  no  sense  can  he  be  called  an  educated  or  cultivated 
man.  As  the  development  of  a  single  member  or  organ 
of  the  body  is  not  true  physical  culture,  so  the  inordinate 
development  of  the  memory,  the  imagination,  or  the  rea 
soning  faculty,  is  not  intellectual  culture.  The  lirst  con 
dition  of  successful  bodily  labor  is  health;  and,  as  a  man  in 
health  can  do  what  an  unhealthy  man  cannot  do,  and  as, 
of  this  health,  the  properties  are  strength,  energy,  agility, 
graceful  carriage  and  action,  manual  dexterity,  and  endur 
ance  of  fatigue,  so,  in  like  manner,  general  culture  of  mind 
is  the  best  aid  to  professional  and  scientific  study,  and  the 
educated  man  can  do  what  the  illiterate  man  cannot.  As 
Prof.  J.  H.  Newman, —  himself  a  brilliant  example  of  the 
culture  that  comes  from  liberal  studies, —  remarks:  "The 
man  who  has  learned  to  think,  and  to  reason,  and  to 
compare,  and  to  discriminate,  and  to  analyze;  who  has 
refined  his  taste,  and  formed  his  judgment,  and  sharpened 
his  mental  vision,  will  not  indeed  at  once  be  a  lawyer,  or  a 
pleader,  or  an  orator,  or  a  statesman,  or  a  physician,  or  a 
good  landlord,  or  a  man  of  business,  or  a  soldier,  or  an 
engineer,  or  a  chemist,  or  a  geologist,  or  an  antiquarian; 
but  he  will  be  placed  in  that  state  of  intellect  in  which  he 
can  take  up  any  one  of  these  sciences  or  callings,  or  any 
other  for  which  he  has  a  taste  or  special  talent,  with  an 
ease,  a  grace,  a  versatility,  and  a  success,  to  which  another 
is  a  stranger." 

Let  us  not  be  misunderstood.  We  cherish  no  extreme 
opinions  on  this  subject.  We  have  no  sympathy  with 
those  who  think  that  all  wisdom  is  summed  up  in  a 
knowledge  of  Greek  particles, —  with  the  men  who  can 
give  exactly  all  the  dates  of  the  petty  skirmishes  in  the 


124  MORAL   GRAHAMISM. 

Peloponnesian  War,  and  yet  have  always  supposed  that 
Hyde  and  Clarendon  were  different  persons, —  or  men 
like  Dr.  George,  who  doubted  whether  Frederick  the  Great, 
with  all  his  victories,  could  conjugate  a  Greek  verb  in 
mi.  We  cannot  think  a  tittle  less  of  Burke's  genius, 
because,  in  the  House  of  Commons,  he  accented  the 
antepenult  instead  of  the  penult  of  vectigal;  or  of  the 
Duke  of  Wellington's,  because,  though  he  conquered 
Napoleon,  he  turned  round,  when  reading  his  Chancellor's 
address  at  Oxford,  and  whispered,  "I  say,  is  it  Jac-o-bus?" 
But  we  do  contend  that,  as  the  records  of  human  thought 
are  in  many  languages,  so  no  man  can  be  deemed  edu 
cated  who  knows  no  language  but  a  modern  one,  and 
that  his  own.  That  person  cannot,  certainly,  be  called 
an  intelligent  workman  who  has  no  care  for  the  state  or 
condition  of  the  instrument  with  which  he  works.  If 
the  sword  be  blunt,  or  made  of  inferior  steel,  it  will  do 
little  execution.  If  the  vessel  wants  capacity,  you  cannot 
freight  her  with  a  valuable  cargo;  or  if  her  engine  wants 
power,  she  will  make  little  headway  against  the  billows. 
The  mind  is  the  man's  instrument,  be  he  lawyer,  doctor, 
merchant,  engineer,  or  farmer;  and  the  stronger  and  more 
highly  finished  the  instrument,  the  better  will  be  its 
work. 

If  there  is  any  one  faculty  of  the  mind  which  is  more 
valuable  than  the  others, —  which  is  absolutely  indispen 
sable  to  success  in  every  calling, —  it  is  the  judgment.  It 
is  the  master-principle  of  business,  literature,  and  science, 
which  qualifies  one  to  grapple  with  any  subject  he  may 
apply  himself  to,  and  enables  him  to  seize  the  strong 
point  in  it.  How  is  this  power  to  be  obtained?  Is  it 
by  the  study  of  any  one  subject,  however  important? 


MORAL   GRAHAMISM.  125 

Assuredly  not;  but  only  by  study  and  comparison  of  the 
most  opposite  things;  by  the  most  varied  reading  and 
discipline  first,  and  observation  afterwards.  If  there  is 
one  well-ascertained  fact  in  education,  it  is,  that  the  man 
who  has  been  trained  to  think  upon  one  subject  will 
never  be  a  good  judge  even  in  that  one;  whereas  the 
enlargement  of  his  circle  gives  him  increased  knowledge 
and  power  in  a  rapidly-increasing  ratio, —  so  much  do 
ideas  act,  not  as  solitary  units,  but  by  grouping  and 
combination;  so  necessary  is  it  to  know  something  of  a 
thousand  other  things,  in  order  to  know  one  thing  well. 
It  is,  however,  the  meanest  of  all  the  cants  of  igno 
rance  to  assert  that  there  is  any  incompatibility  between 
business  or  practical  talents  and  scholarship, —  for  the 
successful  booby  to  cry  down  accomplishments  in  the 
counting-room  or  the  carpenter's  shop.  As  if  cultivated 
intelligence,  added  to  refinement  of  manners  and  system 
atic  order,  should  accomplish  less  than  undisciplined  native 
power !  —  as  if  the  Damascus  blade  lost  its  edge  by  being 
polished,  or  as  if  the  supporting  column  of  an  edifice  were 
less  strong  because  its  shaft  is  fluted  and  its  capital  carved! 
We  believe  that  it  might  easily  be  shown  that  a  liberal 
education,  which  is  only  another  name  for  intelligence, 
knowledge,  intellectual  force,  promotes  success  in  every 
honest  calling,  even  though  that  calling  be  to  cut  cheese 
or  open  oysters, —  or,  even  lower  still,  to  make  political 
speeches  and  electioneer  for  Congress.  But,  suppose  that 
it  were  not  so;  that  it  did  not  contribute  one  jot  or  tittle 
to  success,  in  the  vulgar  sense  of  that  word.  Were  men 
designed  to  be  mere  merchants,  farmers,  or  mechanics,  and 
nothing  more?  Man  is  not  a  means,  but  an  end.  He 
claims  a  generous  culture,  not  because  he  is  to  follow  the 


126  MORAL   GRAHAMISM. 

plow,  wield  the  sledge,  or  buy  and  sell  wheat  or  cotton,  but 
because  he  is  man.  The  fact  that  the  ordinary  pursuits 
of  life  are  widely  removed  from  liberal  studies  is  of  itself 
a  cogent  reason  why  those  who  are  to  be  incessantly 
dealing  with  material  forms  should  early  foster  a  taste 
for  those  studies  which,  in  the  language  of  another, 
"  reclaim  men  from  the  dominion  of  the  senses ;  recruit 
their  overtasked  energies;  quicken  within  them  the  sensi 
bilities  of  taste;  and  invite  them  to  the  contemplation  oi 
whatever  is  lovely  in  the  sympathies  of  our  common 
nature,  splendid  in  the  conquests  of  intellect,  or  heroic  in 
the  trials  of  virtue." 

Those  who  clamor  for  the  so-called  "  practical  educa 
tion "  forget  that,  antecedent  to  his  calling  as  merchant, 
engineer,  or  carpenter,  there  is  another  profession,  more 
important  still,  for  which  every  man  should  be  trained, 
"  the  profession  of  humanity."  As  Rousseau,  in  his  famous 
treatise  on  education,  which  contains  many  golden  truths 
imbedded  among  its  errors,  justly  says:  "Nature  has 
destined  us  for  the  offices  of  human  life,  antecedently  to 
our  destination  concerning  society.  To  live,  is  the  profes 
sion  I  would  teach  him  [a  youth].  Let  him  first  be  a 
man;  he  will,  on  occasion,  as  soon  become  anything  else 
that  a  man  ought  to  be  as  any  person  whatever.  Fortune 
may  remove  him  from  one  place  to  another  as  she  pleases; 
he  will  always  be  found  in  his  place."  We  believe  in 
"practical"  education  most  sincerely;  only  we  would  use 
the  word  in  its  broadest  and  most  comprehensive  sense. 
We  call  that  education  practical  which  educes  all  a  man's 
faculties,  and  gives  him  possession  of  himself.  We  call 
that  practical  education  which  enables  a  man  to  bring  all 
his  faculties  to  bear  at  once  with  energy  and  earnestness 


MO11AL   GKAHAMISM.  127 

on  any  given  point,  and  to  keep  them  fastened  on  that 
point  until  the  task  he  has  set  for  them  is  accomplished, 
We  call  that  education  practical  which  gives  a  man  a  clear, 
conscious  view  of  his  own  opinions  and  judgments,  and 
enables  him  to  develop  them  with  fullness,  to  express  them 
with  eloquence,  and  to  urge  them  with  force.  That  is  practi 
cal  education  which  teaches  him  to  see  things  as  they  are, 
to  go  right  to  the  point,  to  disentangle  a  skein  of  thought,  to 
detect  what  is  sophistical,  and  to  discard  what  is  irrelevant. 
That  is  practical  education  which  enables  him  to  estimate 
with  precision  the  worth  of  an  argument,  to  detect  the 
hidden  relations  of  things,  to  trace  effects  to  their  causes, 
to  grasp  a  mass  of  detached  and  dislocated  facts,  reduce 
them  to  order  and  harmony,  and  marshal  them  under  the 
sway  of  some  general  law.  That  is  practical  education 
which  enables  him  to  know  his  own  weakness,  to  command 
his  own  passions,  to  adapt  himself  to  circumstances,  to  per 
ceive  the  significance  of  actions,  events,  and  opinions. 
That  is  practical  education  which  opens  his  mind,  expands 
it,  and  refines  it;  fits  it  to  digest,  master,  and  use  its 
knowledge;  gives  it  flexibility,  tact,  method,  critical  exact 
ness,  sagacity,  discrimination,  resource,  address  and  expres 
sion. 

Such  a  man  is  full  of  resources,  and  prepared  for  any 
event.  Misfortunes  cannot  kill  him,  nor  disasters  depress 
him.  He  organizes  victory  out  of  defeat,  and  converts 
obstacles  into  stepping-stones  to  success.  Life  to  him  is 
never  stale,  flat,  and  unprofitable;  but  always  fresh, 
stimulating,  opulent.  In  the  words  of  the  polished  writer 
already  quoted,  "He  is  at  home  in  any  society;  he  has 
common  ground  with  every  class;  he  knows  when  to 
speak,  and  when  to  be  silent:  he  is  able  to  converse,  he 


128  MORAL   GRAHAMISM. 

is  able  to  listen;  he  can  ask  a  question  pertinently,  and 
gain  a  lesson  seasonably  when  he  has  nothing  to  impart 
himself;  he  is  ever  ready,  yet  never  in  the  way;  he  is  a 
pleasant  companion,  and  a  comrade  you  can  depend  upon; 
he  knows  when  to  be  serious,  and  when  to  trifle,  and  he 
has  a  sure  tact  which  enables  him  to  trifle  with  grace 
fulness  and  to  be  serious  with  effect.  He  has  the  repose 
of  a  mind  which  lives  in  itself  while  it  lives  in  the 
world,  and  which  has  resources  for  its  happiness  at  home 
when  it  cannot  go  abroad.  He  has  a  gift  which  serves 
him  in  public  and  supports  him  in  retirement,  without 
which  good  fortune  is  but  vulgar,  and  with  which  failure 
and  disappointment  have  a  charm." 


STRENGTH  AND  HEALTH. 


T""\IO  LEWIS,  whose  writings  on  bodiculture,  if  they 
-*— *  are  not  very  profound,  have,  at  least,  the  merit  of 
brevity  and  good  sense,  calls  the  attention  of  the  public 
to  the  prevailing  fallacy  that  strength  is  a  synonym  for 
health.  He  knows  intelligent  persons  who  really  believe 
that  you  may  determine  the  comparative  health  of  two 
men  by  measuring  their  arms.  The  man  whose  arm 
measures  twelve  inches  is  twice  as  healthy  as  he  whose 
arm  measures  but  six.  "  This  strange  and  thoughtless 
misapprehension,"  he  says,  "  has  given  rise  to  nearly  all 
the  mistakes  thus  far  made  in  the  physical-culture  move 
ment.  I  have  a  friend  who  can  lift  nine  hundred  pounds, 
and  yet  is  a  habitual  sufferer  from  torpid  liver,  rheuma 
tism,  and  low  spirits.  The  cartmen  of  our  cities,  who 
are  our  strongest  men,  are  far  from  being  the  healthiest 
class,  as  physicians  will  testify.  On  the  contrary,  I  have 
many  friends  who  would  stagger  under  three  hundred 
pounds,  that  are  in  capital  trim." 

These  truths  seem  so  obvious,  when  thus  stated  and 
illustrated,  as  hardly  to  rise  above  commonplace.  Why, 
then,  repeat  them?  Because,  by  the  vast  majority  of 
"  health-lifters,"  gymnasium-frequenters,  and  would-be  ath 
letes,  they  are  either  unknown  or  practically  ignored. 
Every  pale,  sickly,  pigmy-limbed  man  wants  to  be  phys 
ically  strong;  to  be  a  Hercules,  a  §on  of  Anak,  at  least 


130  STRENGTH   AND   HEALTH. 

a  small  Heenan,  is  absolutely  essential,  he  thinks,  to  the 
enjoyment  of  perfect  health.  If  he  cannot  expect  to  lift 
a  ton,  or  to  walk  a  thousand  miles  in  a  thousand  hours, 
he  must,  at  least,  be  able  to  take  a  daily  "  constitutional " 
of  five  miles  and  back,  or  to  raise  five  hundred  pounds 
without  bursting  a  blood-vessel.  But  what  is  the  mean 
ing  of  the  word  "strong"?  From  the  glibness  with 
which  some  men  repeat  the  term,  one  would  suppose 
that  nothing  is  easier  than  to  define  it, —  that  the  propo 
sition  that  a  man  is  very  strong  is  as  simple  as  the 
proposition  that  he  is  six  feet  high.  The  truth  is,  how 
ever,  that  the  word  is  ambiguous, —  that  under  its  seem 
ing  unity  there  lurks  a  real  dualism  of  meaning,  as  a 
few  facts  will  show. 

In  the  first  place,  one  of  the  most  obvious  tests  of 
strength  is  the  power  of  exertion.  But  great  power  of 
exertion  may  co-exist  with  extreme  delicacy  of  organism, 
and  even  with  organic  disease.  Napoleon,  who  slept  four 
hours  and  was  on  horseback  twenty, —  who  toiled  so  ter 
ribly  that  he  half-killed  his  secretaries, —  underwent 
fatigues  that  would  have  broken  down  nine  out  of 
ten  "strong"  men;  yet  his  digestion  was  always  delicate 
and  easily  deranged,  and  he  died  of  an  hereditary  organic 
disease  at  the  age  of  55.  Julius  Caesar  was  not  what  is 
popularly  called  a  "  strong  "  man ;  yet  he  was  a  prodigy 
of  exertion  and  endurance.  Again:  it  is  a  striking  fact 
that  great  power  of  exertion  in  one  direction  does  not 
always  imply  its  existence  in  another.  There  are  hun 
dreds  of  men  who  can  perform  tasks  that  severely  tax 
the  muscles,  and  endure  with  impunity  all  kinds  of  ex 
posure  and  hardship,  who  collapse  under  a  continuous 
and  severe  strain  upon  the  eyes,  the  brain,  and  the 


STRENGTH   AND   HEALTH.  131 

nerves;  and  the  converse  is  as  often  seen.  Dr.  Elam,  the 
author  of  that  deeply  interesting  work,  "  A  Physician's 
Problems,"  tells  us  that  not  long  ago  a  friend  reviewed 
with  him  the  names  of  six  or  eight  upper  wranglers  at 
the  English  Universities  for  the  last  twenty  years,  and 
that,  with  very  few  exceptions,  these  and  nearly  all  the 
"double  first"  men  were  alive  and  well;  while,  on  the 
other  hand,  on  reviewing  the  history  of  two  boats'  crews 
of  picked  men,  of  whom  they  had  full  and  accurate  in 
formation,  they  found  that  not  one  of  them  was  alive. 
Surely,  such  havoc  as  this  was  never  found  among  men 
tal  athletes. 

Again,  while  there  is  a  recognized  limit  to  physical 
endurance,  the  limit  to  mental  toil  or  strain  is  by  no 
means  so  well  denned.  A  man  may  saw  wood,  plough 
the  earth,  or  lay  brick,  until  he  is  physically  exhausted, 
and  can  do  no  more ;  but  the  limit  of  mental  labor  is 
far  less  evident.  Look  at  the  amount  of  work  which 
that  dwarf,  hunchback,  and  invalid, —  that  "drop  of  pure 
spirit  in  cotton  wool," — Alexander  Pope,  contrived  to 
perform!  When  he  got  up  in  the  morning,  he  had  to 
be  sewed  up  in  stiff  canvass  stays,  without  which  he 
could  not  stand  erect.  His  thin  body  was  wrapped  in 
fur  and  flannel,  and  his  meagre,  spectral  legs  required 
three  pairs  of  stockings  to  give  them  a  respectable  look. 
Almost  literally  a  pigmy  in  size,  he  was  so  deformed 
that  his  life  was  one  long  disease.  Look  at  brave  Samuel 
Johnson,  so  feeble  as  a  child  that  the  physician  said  he 
never  knew  another  raised  with  such  difficulty, —  struggling 
all  his  life  with  a  severe  scrofulous  disorder,  that  twisted 
his  body  into  strange  contortions,  and  with  a  constitu 
tional  depression  and  hypochondria,  "a  vile  melancholy," 


132  STRENGTH   AND   HEALTH. 

that  kept  him,  as  he  said,  "  mad  half  his  life,  or  at  least, 
not  sober," — so  languid  at  times  that  he  could  hardly 
tell  the  hour  on  the  clock,  and  yet,  with  one  pair  of 
hands  and  one  brain,  doing  the  work  of  an  academy! 
In  spite  of  his  exhausting  labors  and  still  more  exhaust 
ing  diseases,  he  lived  to  the  age  of  seventy-five.  See,  again, 
the  giant  labors  performed  by  Channing,  with  his  frail, 
clayey  tabernacle;  and  note  the  vast  amount  of  writing 
and  other  useful  work  performed  by  those  physical  ghosts 
of  men,  Professor  Goddard,  of  Brown  University,  and 
the  late  Professor  Hadley,  of  Yale !  Need  we  add  to  these 
the  cases  of  Torstenson,  the  Swedish  General,  who,  af 
flicted  with  gout,  had  to  be  borne  on  a  litter,  yet  by  the 
rapidity  of  his  movements  astonished  Europe;  or  that  of 
General  Wolfe,  who,  though  the  seeds  of  several  fatal  dis 
eases  were  laid  in  his  constitution  from  infancy,  yet 
wrested  from  the  French  the  Gibraltar  of  America;  or 
that  of  Palmerston,  who,  according  to  Sir  Henry  Holland, 
under  a  fit  of  gout  which  would  have  sent  other  men 
groaning  to  their  couches,  used  to  continue  his  work  of 
reading  or  writing  on  public  business  almost  without 
abatement,  amid  the  chaos  of  papers  which  covered  the 
floor  as  well  as  the  tables  of  his  room? 

But,  some  one  will  ask,  has  that  spectral-looking  lawyer, 
or  that  statesman,  who  apparently  performs  such  prodigies 
of  labor, —  that  pale,  lean  man  with  a  face  like  parchment, 
and  nothing  on  his  bones, —  a  constitution?  We  answer  in 
the  words  of  the  London  "  Times"  to  a  similar  query  some 
years  ago, —  "Yes,  he  has;  he  has  a  working  constitution, 
and  a  ten  times  better  one  than  you,  my  good  friend,  with 
your  ruddy  face,  and  strong,  muscular  frame.  You  look, 
indeed,  the  very  picture  of  health,  but  you  have^  in  reality, 


STRENGTH   AKD    HEALTH.  133 

only  a  sporting  constitution,  not  a  working  one.  You  do 
very  well  for  the  open  air,  and  get  on  tolerably  well  with 
fine,  healthy  exercise,  and  no  strain  on  your  brain.  But 
try  close  air  for  a  week, —  try  confinement,  with  heaps  of 
confused  papers,  blue  books,  law  books,  or  books  of  refer 
ence  to  get  through,  and  therefrom  extract  liquid  and 
transparent  results,  and  you  will  find  yourself  knocked 
up  and  fainting,  when  the  pale,  lean  man  is  —  if  not  'as 
fresh  as  a  daisy,'  which  he  never  is,  being  of  the  perpetu 
ally  cadaverous  type, —  at  least  as  unaffected  as  a  bit  of 
leather,  and  not  showing  the  smallest  sign  of  giving  way. 
There  are  two  sorts  of  good  constitutions, — good  idle  con 
stitutions,  and  good  working  ones." 

Another  test  of  strength  is  the  power  of  enduring  hard 
ship,  touching  which  we  see  repeated  the  paradox  we  have 
already  noted.  Far  from  being  associated  invariably  with 
great  muscular  force,  this  power  is  often  found  in  union 
with  extreme  delicacy  of  organization.  Who,  in  catas 
trophes  and  seasons  of  great  peril,  has  not  seen  frail,  deli 
cate  women,  who  would  scream  and  almost  faint  at  the 
sight  of  a  mouse,  bear  up  under  toils,  perils,  and  sufferings 
which  would  kill  the  stoutest  men  ?  Who  has  forgotten  the 
Iignum-vita3  toughness  of  Dr.  Kane?  Though  a  sailor  by 
profession,  he  never  went  to  sea  without  suffering  from 
sea-sickness;  he  had  a  heart  disease  and  a  chronic  rheu 
matism;  yet  he  had  a  vitality, —  an  iron  endurance, — which 
enabled  him  to  go  through  sufferings  in  the  Arctic  Seas 
under  which  big,  burly  sailors,  and  other  men  specially 
trained  to  endure  such  hardships,  sank  into  the  grave. 
William  III,  of  England,  was  not  a  strong  man,  nor  was 
Luxemburg,  his  fiery  opponent  in  the  Netherlands.  A 
Greek  educator  would  have  deemed  it  an  abuse  of  the 


134  STRENGTH   AND   HEALTH. 

medical  art  to  cherish  the  flickering  flame  of  life  in  either 
of  them.  Yet  it  is  doubtful  whether  among  the  two  hun 
dred  thousand  men  whom  they  commanded,  there  was  one 
with  greater  power  of  endurance  than  that  of  the  hunch 
backed  dwarf  that  led  the  fiery  hosts  of  France,  or  that  of 
the  asthmatic  skeleton  that  conducted  the  stubborn  troops 
of  England. 

In  thinking  of  the  ideal  of  humanity, —  the  great  man, 
—  we  almost  always  picture  him  as  a  noble  bodily  presence, 
full  of  health  and  vigor,  and  with  a  mind  as  healthy  and 
vigorous  as  its  abode.  Yet  how  often  is  this  notion  contra 
dicted  by  the  facts !  In  what  mean  and  unsightly  caskets 
have  some  of  the  rarest  and  most  potent  essences  of  nature 
been  enclosed! 

Among  the  tests  of  strength,  longevity  must  be  consid 
ered  one;  and  here  we  are  confronted  by  facts  that  make 
the  explanation  of  "  strength "  still  more  difficult.  Dr. 
Elam  cites  the  names  of  twenty-five  celebrated  thinkers, 
than  whom  none  have  ever  exerted  a  greater  influence 
upon  literature,  history,  and  philosophy,  who  lived  to  the 
average  age  of  ninety  years.  Yet  many  of  them,  it  is  well 
known,  were  prodigious  workers  and  voluminous  authors, 
and  not  a  few  of  them,  there  is  reason  to  believe,  would  be 
regarded  by  our  modern  physical-culture  men  as  weaklings. 
One  of  them,  Galen,  wrote  three  hundred  volumes,  and 
lived  nearly  a  century;  another,  who  had  a  very  feeble 
constitution,  and  wrote  seven  or  eight  hours  daily, —  Lewis 
Cornaro, —  reached  a  full  hundred  years.  On  the  other 
hand,  Dr.  Winship,  the  leading  apostle  of  "  muscular  Chris 
tianity"  in  this  country,  who  at  one  time  could  lift  a 
weight  of  three  thousand  pounds,  died  at  the  age  of  forty- 
two.  Ascertain  the  united  ages  of  twenty-five  of  the  most 
eminent  farmers  the  world  has  seen,  and  is  it  probable  that 


STRENGTH   AND   HEALTH.  135 

the  sum  total  would  amount,  as  in  the  case  of  these  think 
ers,  to  twenty- two  hundred  and  fifty  years? 

It  is  customary,  where  a  seemingly  feeble  man,  tortured 
with  disease,  shows  a  durability  or  toughness  which  an 
athletic  man  lacks,  outliving  and  outworking  him,  to  ex 
plain  the  mystery  by  saying  that  the  former  has  "  a  better 
constitution"  than  the  lattar.  But  does  this  solve  the 
riddle?  Evidently  not.  It  simply  gives  it  another  name. 
What  is  that  thing  which,  for  convenience,  or  to  hide  our 
ignorance,  we  call  "  constitution,"  which  may  be  constant 
ly  impaired,  but  has  the  ability  to  withstand  so  many 
shocks?  It  has  been  well  observed  by  a  thoughtful 
writer  that  "  a  table  would  not  be  called  strong  if  two  of 
its  legs  were  cracked  and  several  of  its  joints  loose,  how 
ever  tough  might  be  its  materials,  and  however  good  its 
original  workmanship.  But  if  the  table  showed  a  power 
of  holding  together  and  recovering  itself,  notwithstanding 
every  sort  of  rough  usage,  it  might  well  be  called  strong, 
though  it  was  ultimately  broken  up;  and  its  strength 
might  not  unnaturally  be  measured  by  the  quantity  of  ill- 
usage  which  it  survived.  It  is  precisely  in  this  power  of 
self -repair  that  the  difference  between  a  body  and  a  mere 
machine  -resides.  The  difficulty  of  saying  what  is  meant 
by  physical  strength  is  in  the  difficulty  of  distinguishing 
between  the  mechanical  and  what,  for  fault  of  a  better 
word,  must  be  called  the  vital  powers  of  the  body.  Look 
upon  the  body  as  a  machine,  and  the  broken  arm,  the 
tubercles  in  the  lungs,  or  the  cancer  in  the  liver,  prevent 
you  from  calling  it  strong;  but,  if  it  goes  on  acting  for 
years,  and  wonderfully  recovering  itself  again  and  again 
from  the  catastrophe  which  these  defects  tend  to  produce, 
there  must  be  a  strong  something  somewhere.  What  and 
where  is  that  something  ?  " 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OP  BOOKS  AND 
READING.* 


THE  value  of  books  as  a  means  of  culture  is  at  this 
day  recognized  by  all  men.  The  chief  allies  and 
instruments  of  teachers,  they  are  the  best  substitutes 
for  teachers,  and,  next  to  a  good  college,  a  good  library 
may  well  be  chosen  as  a  means  of  education.  Indeed,  a 
book  is  a  voiceless  teacher,  and  a  great  library  is  a  virtual 
university.  A  literary  taste  is  at  once  the  most  efficient 
instrument  of  self-education  and  the  purest  source  of  en 
joyment  the  world  affords.  It  brings  its  possessor  into 
ever-renewing  communion  with  all  that  is  noblest  and  best 
in  the  thought  of  the  past.  The  winnowed  and  garnered 
wisdom  of  the  ages  is  his  daily  food.  Whatever  is  lofty, 
profound,  or  acute  in  speculation,  delicate  or  refined  in 
feeling,  wise,  witty,  or  quaint  in  suggestion,  is  accessible  to 
the  lover  of  books.  They  enlarge  space  for  him  and  pro 
long  time.  More  wonderful  than  the  wishing  cap  of  the 
Arabian  tales,  they  transport  him  back  to  former  days. 
The  orators  declaim  for  him  and  the  poets  sing.  He  be 
comes  an  inhabitant  of  every  country,  a  contemporary  of 
all  ages,  and  converses  with  the  wisest,  the  noblest,  the 
tenderest,  and  the  purest  spirits  that  have  adorned  human 
ity.  All  the  sages  have  thought  and  have  acted  for  him ; 

*This  essay  is  reprinted,  by  permission,  with  some  changes,  from  a  paper 
contributed  by  the  author  to  the  Special  Report  on  "The  Public  Libraries 
of  the  United  States  of  America,  their  History,  Condition  and  Management." 
lately  made  by  Hon.  John  Eaton,  LL.D.,  Commissioner  of  the  U.  S.  Bureau  of 
Education,  and  published  at  Washington. 


OF  BOOKS  AND  READIKG.       137 

or,  rather,  he  has  lived  with  them;  he  has  hearkened  to 
their  teachings;  he  has  been  the  witness  of  their  great 
examples;  and,  before  setting  his  foot  abroad  in  the  world, 
has  acquired  the  experience  of  more  countries  than  the 
patriarchs  saw. 

The  most  original  thinkers  have  been  most  ready  to 
acknowledge  their  obligations  to  other  minds,  whose  wis 
dom  has  been  hived  in  books.  Gibbon  acquired  from  his 
aunt  "  an  early  and  invincible  love  of  reading,  which,"  he 
declared,  "  he  would  not  exchange  for  the  treasures  of 
India."  Doctor  Franklin  traced  his  entire  career  to  Cotton 
Mather's  "  Essays  to  Do  Good,"  which  fell  into  his  hands 
when  he  was  a  boy.  The  current  of  Jeremy  Bentham's 
thoughts  was  directed  for  life  by  a  single  phrase,  "  The 
greatest  good  of  the  greatest  number,"  caught  at  the  end 
of  a  pamphlet.  Cobbett,  at  eleven,  bought  Swift's  "  Tale  of 
a  Tub,"  and  it  proved  what  he  considered  a  sort  of  "  birth 
of  intellect."  The  genius  of  Faraday  was  fired  by  the  vol 
umes  which  he  perused  while  serving  as  an  apprentice  to 
an  English  bookseller.  One  of  the  most  distinguished  per 
sonages  in  Europe,  showing  his  library  to  a  visitor,  ob 
served  that  not  only  this  collection,  but  all  his  social  suc 
cesses  in  life,  he  traced  back  to  "  the  first  franc  he  saved 
from  the  cake  shop  to  spend  at  a  bookstall."  Lord  Macau- 
lay,  having  asked  an  eminent  soldier  and  diplomatist,  who 
enjoyed  the  confidence  of  the  first  generals  and  statesmen 
of  the  age,  to  what  he  owed  his  accomplishments,  was  in 
formed  that  he  ascribed  it  to  the  fact  that  he  was  quar 
tered,  in  his  young  days,  in  the  neighborhood  of  an  excel 
lent  library,  to  which  he  had  access.  The  French  historian 
Michelet  attributed  his  mental  inspiration  to  a  single  book, 
a  Virgil,  he  lived  with  for  some  years;  and  he  tells  us  that 


138          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AHD   READING. 

an  odd  volume  of  Racine,  picked  up  at  a  stall  on  the  quay, 
made  the  poet  of  Toulon.  "  If  the  riches  of  both  Indies," 
said  Fenelon,  "  if  the  crowns  of  all  the  kingdoms  of  Europe, 
were  laid  at  my  feet,  in  exchange  for  my  love  of  reading, 
I  would  spurn  them  all."  Books  not  only  enrich  and  en 
large  the  mind,  but  they  stimulate,  inflame,  and  concen 
trate  its  activity;  and  though  without  this  reception  of 
foreign  influence  a  man  may  be  odd,  he  cannot  be  original. 
The  greatest  genius  is  he  who  consumes  the  most  knowl 
edge  and  converts  it  into  mind.  What,  indeed,  is  college 
education  but  the  reading  of  certain  books  which  the  com 
mon  sense  of  all  scholars  agrees  will  represent  the  science 
already  accumulated? 

A  well-known  American  writer  says  that  books  are  only 
for  one's  idle  hours.  This  may  be  true  of  an  Emerson; 
but  how  many  Emersons  are  there  in  the  reading  public? 
If  the  man  who  gets  almost  all  his  information  from  the 
printed  page,  "needs  a  strong  head  to  bear  that  diet," 
what  must  be  the  condition  of  his  head  who  abstains  from 
this  aliment?  A  Pascal,  when  his  books  are  taken  from 
him  to  save  his  health,  injured  by  excessive  study,  may 
supply  their  place  by  the  depth  and  force  of  his  personal 
reflection;  but  there  is  hardly  one  Pascal  in  a  century. 
Wollaston  made  many  discoveries  with  a  hatful  of  lenses 
and  some  bits  of  glass  and  crystal;  but  common  people 
need  a  laboratory  as  rich  as  Tyndall's.  To  assume  that 
the  mental  habits  which  will  do  for  a  man  of  genius  will 
do  for  all  men  who  would  make  the  most  of  their  facul 
ties,  is  to  exaggerate  an  idiosyncrasy  into  a  universal  law. 
The  method  of  nature,  it  has  been  well  said,  is  not  ecstasy, 
but  patient  attention.  "  There  are  two  things  to  be  con 
sidered  in  the  matter  of  inspiration;  one  is,  the  infinite 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OP   BOOKS   AND   READING.         139 

God  from  whom  it  comes,  the  other  the  finite  capacity 
which  is  to  receive  it.  If  Newton  had  never  studied,  it 
would  have  been  as  easy  for  God  to  have  revealed  the  cal 
culus  to  his  dog  Diamond  as  to  Newton.  We  once  heard 
of  a  man  who  thought  everything  was  in  the  soul,  and  so 
gave  up  all  reading,  all  continuous  thought.  Said  another, 
'  If  all  is  in  the  soul,  it  takes  a  man  to  find  it.' "  It  is  true 
that,  as  Ecclesiasticus  tells  us,  "  a  man's  mind  is  sometimes 
wont  to  tell  him  more  than  seven  watchmen  that  sit  above 
in  a  high  tower";  but  it  is  also  true  that  the  man  will 
hear  most  of  all  who  hearkens  to  his  own  mind  and  to  the 
seven  watchmen  besides. 

No  doubt  books,  like  every  other  blessing,  may  be 
abused.  "Reading,"  as  Bacon  says,  "  makes  a  full  man"; 
and  so  does  eating;  but  fullness,  without  digestion,  is 
dyspepsia,  and  induces  sleepiness  and  flabbiness,  both  fatal 
to  activity.  The  best  books  are  useless,  if  the  book-worm 
is  not  a  living  creature.  The  mulberry  leaf  must  pass 
through  the  silkworm's  stomach  before  it  can  become  silk, 
and  the  leaves  which  are  to  clothe  our  mental  nakedness 
must  be  chewed  and  digested  by  a  living  intellect.  The 
mind  of  the  wise  reader  will  react  upon  its  acquisitions, 
and  will  grow  rich,  not  by  hoarding  borrowed  treasures, 
but  by  turning  everything  into  gold.  There  are  readers 
whose  wit  is  so  smothered  under  the  weight  of  their  accu 
mulations  as  to  be  absolutely  powerless.  It  was  said  of 
Robert  Southey  that  he  gave  so  much  time  to  the  minds  of 
other  men  that  he  never  found  time  to  look  into  his  own. 
Robert  Hall  said  of  Dr.  Kippis  that  he  piled  so  many  books 
upon  his  head  that  his  brains  could  not  move.  It  was  to 
such  helluones  librorum,  or  literary  anacondas,  who  are 
possessed  by  their  knowledge,  not  possessed  of  it,  that 


140          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AtfD   READING. 

Hobbes  of  Malmesbury  alluded,  when  he  said  that  had  he 
read  as  many  books  as  other  men,  he  would  have  known 
as  little.  There  is  in  many  minds,  as  Abernethy  com 
plained  of  his,  a  point  of  saturation,  which  if  one  passes, 
by  putting  in  more  than  his  mind  can  hold,  he  only  drives 
out  something  already  in.  The  history  of  competitive  ex 
aminations  shows  that  the  kind  of  knowledge  gained  by 
cramming  is  painfully  evanescent;  it  melts  away  with  lack 
of  use,  and  leaves  nothing  behind.  It  was  one  of  the  ad 
vantages  of  the  intellectual  giants  of  old,  that  the  very 
scantiness  of  their  libraries,  by  compelling  them  to  think  for 
themselves,  saved  them  from  that  habit  of  intellectual  de 
pendence, —  of  supplying  one's  ideas  from  foreign  sources, — 
which  is  as  sure  to  enfeeble  the  thinking  faculty  as  is  a 
habit  of  dram-drinking  to  enfeeble  the  tone  of  the  stomach. 
But  though  books  may  be  thus  abused,  and  many  fine  wits, 
like  Dr.  Oldbuck's,  "lie  sheathed  to  the  hilt  in  ponderous 
tomes,"  will  any  man  contend  that  such  abuse  is  neces 
sary?  The  merely  passive  reader,  who  never  wrestles  with 
his  author,  may  seem  to  be  injured  by  the  works  he  pe 
ruses;  but  in  most  cases  the  injury  was  done  before  he 
began  to  read.  A  really  active  mind  will  not  be  weighed 
down  by  its  knowledge  any  more  than  an  oak  by  its  leaves, 
or  than  was  Samson  by  his  locks.  John  Milton  walked 
gracefully  enough  under  the  load  of  his  immense  learning; 
and  the  flame  of  Bishop  Butler's  genius  was  certainly  not 
stifled  by  the  mass  of  books  he  consumed.  Great  piles  of 
fuel,  which  put  out  the  little  fires,  only  make  the  great 
fires  burn.  If  a  man  is  injured  by  multifarious  knowl 
edge,  it  is  not  because  his  mind  does  not  crave  and  need 
the  most  various  food,  but  because  it  "goes  into  a  bad 
skin."  His  learning  is  mechanically,  not  chemically, 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING.          141 

united  to  the  mind;  incorporated  by  contact,  and  not  by 
solution.  The  author  of  "Hudibras"  tells  us  that  the 
sword  of  his  hero  sometimes 

" — ate  into  itself  for  lack 
Of  somebody  to  hew  or  hack/' 

and  there  is  reason  to  believe  that  the  mind  may  be  as 
fatally  enfeebled  by  turning  perpetually  upon  itself,  and 
refusing  all  help  or  impulse  from  abroad,  as  by  burying 
itself  among  books,  and  resting  upon  the  ideas  of  other 
men.  There  are  drones  in  cells  as  well  as  in  libraries. 

Such  being  the  value  of  books,  how  can  the  college  stu 
dent  better  spend  his  leisure  time,  beyond  what  is  required 
for  sleep,  meals,  bodily  exercise,  and  society,  than  in  read 
ing?  But  what  books  shall  he  read,  and  how  shall  he  read, 
them?  Shall  he  let  his  instincts  guide  him  in  the  choice, 
or  shall  he  read  only  the  works  which  have  been  stamped 
with  the  approval  of  the  ages?  How  may  he  acquire,  if 
he  lacks  it,  a  taste  for  the  highest  types,  the  masterpieces, 
of  literature?  Are  there  any  critical  tests  by  which  the 
best  books  may  be  known,  and  is  there  any  art  by  which 
"to  pluck  out  the  heart  of  their  mystery"?  These  ques 
tions,  if  he  is  a  thoughtful  young  man,  anxious  to  make 
the  most  of  his  time  and  opportunities,  will  confront  him 
at  the  very  threshold  of  his  college  life.  Of  the  incom- 
petency  of  most  students  to  answer  them  for  themselves, 
those  persons  who  have  watched  them  when  drawing  books 
from  college  libraries  can  have  little  doubt.  Not  to  speak 
of  the  undergraduates  who  read  merely  for  amusement,  or 
of  the  intellectual  epicures  who  touch  nothing  but  dainties, 
nibbling  at  a  multitude  of  pleasant  dishes  without  getting 
a  good  meal  from  any, —  how  few,  even  of  the  laborious 
and  conscientious  students  who  would  economize  their  pre- 


142          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

cious  moments,  read  wisely,  with  definite  purpose  or  plan! 
How  many,  ignorant  that  there  is  a  natural  order  of  ac 
quirement, —  that,  for  young  readers,  biography  is  better 
than  history,  history  than  philosophy,  descriptive  poetry 
than  metaphysical, —  begin  with  the  toughest,  the  most 
speculative,  or  the  most  deluding  books  they  can  find! 
How  many,  having  been  told  that  the  latest  works  in  cer 
tain  departments  of  knowledge  are  the  best,  plunge  at  once 
into  Mill,  Spencer,  Buckle,  Darwin,  and  Taine!  —  books 
pre-eminently  suggestive  to  well-trained  minds,  but  too 
difficult  of  digestion  for  minds  not  thoroughly  instructed. 
There  is,  perhaps,  no  more  frequent  folly  of  the  young 
than  that  of  reading  hard,  knotty  books,  for  the  sake  of 
great  names, —  neglecting  established  facts  in  science,  his 
tory,  and  literature  to  soar  into  regions  where  their  vanity 
is  nattered  by  novel  and  daring  speculations. 

Again,  how  many  students  read  books  through  by  rote, 
without  interest  or  enjoyment,  without  comprehending  or 
remembering  their  contents,  simply  because  they  have  been 
told  to  read  them,  or  because  some  great  man  has  profited 
by  them !  Who  has  not  seen  young  men  plodding  wearily 
through  bulky  volumes  of  history  or  science,  utterly 
unsuited  to  their  actual  state  of  development,  under  the 
delusion  that  they  were  getting  mental  strength  and  illu 
mination,  when,  in  fact,  they  were  only  inflaming  their 
eyes  and  wasting  their  precious  time?  An  heroic  fresh 
man,  full  of  enthusiasm,  and  burning  to  distinguish  him 
self  by  some  literary  conquest,  fancies  that  it  would  be 
"a  grand  thing"  to  possess  himself  of  universal  history, 
and  so  he  attacks  the  history  of  the  world,  in  seven, 
volumes,  by  M.  Charles  Rollin.  He  plods  through  Hume, 
Gibbon,  Robertson,  and  other  "works  which  no  gentle- 


PKOFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS    AND    READING.          143 

man's  library  should  be  without,"  journeying  over  page 
after  page  with  incredible  patience,  and  with  a  scrupulous 
attention  to  notes,  and,  in  rare  cases,  to  maps,  that  is 
morally  sublime.  No  tome  is  too  thick  for  him,  no  type 
too  small;  whether  the  author  is  luminous  or  voluminous, 
it  is  all  the  same  to  him.  Years  pass,  perhaps  the  young 
man  graduates,  before  the  truth  flashes  upon  him  that  the 
object  of  reading  is  not  to  know  books,  but  things;  that  its 
value  depends  upon  the  insight  it  gives;  and  that  it  is  no 
more  necessary  to  remember  the  books  that  have  made  one 
wise  than  it  is  to  remember  the  dinners  which  have  made 
one  strong.  He  finds  that  instead  of  enriching  and 
invigorating  his  mind  he  has  taken  the  most  effectual 
course  to  stultify  it.  He  has  crammed  his  head  with 
facts,  but  has  extracted  from  them  no  wisdom.  He  has 
mistaken  the  husks  of  history  for  the  fruit,  and  has  no 
more  assimilated  his  heterogeneous  acquisitions  than  a 
millstone  assimilates  the  corn  it  grinds.  The  corn  wears 
out  the  millstone,  giving  it  a  mealy  smell;  and  the  books 
have  worn  out  the  student,  giving  him  only  the  faintest 
odor  of  intellectual  culture  and  discipline.  Almost  every 
college  has  its  literary  Calvin  Edsons, —  living  skeletons 
that  consume  more  mental  food  than  the  strong  and 
healthy,  yet  receive  from  it  little  nourishment, —  remaining 
weak  and  emaciated  on  much,  while  the  man  of  sound 
constitution  grows  vigorous  on  little. 

The  difficulties  of  deciding  what  books  to  read  are 
greatly  multiplied  in  our  day  by  the  enormous  number  of 
volumes  that  weigh  down  the  shelves  of  our  libraries.  In 
the  National  Library  at  Paris  it  is  said  there  are  800,000 
separate  volumes,  or,  according  to  a  late  writer's  estimate. 
148,760  acres  of  printed  paper!  The  library  of  the  British 


144          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

Museum,  which  contains  over  700,000  separate  volumes,  is 
said  to  have  forty  miles  of  book  shelves.  And  yet  the 
largest  library  in  the  world  does  not  contain  over  a 
quarter  part  of  the  books  that  have  been  printed  since 
the  time  of  Gutenberg  and  Fust,  while  new  books  are 
flying  from  the  press  as  thick  as  snowflakes  on  a  wintry 
day.  Five  thousand  new  publications  are  issued  in  a  year 
in  England,  and  it  has  been  ascertained  that  over  ten  thou 
sand  works,  including  maps,  or  a  million  volumes,  are 
poured  forth  annually  from  the  press  of  Germany  alone. 
The  Leipsic  catalogue  contains  the  names  of  fifty  thousand 
German  authors,  and  it  is  estimated  that  the  time  will 
speedily  come  when  the  number  of  German  writers  will 
exceed  that  of  German  readers.  What  reader  is  not 
appalled  by  such  statistics?  Who  can  cope  with  even  the 
masterpieces  of  literature,  to  say  nothing  of  the  scientific 
and  theological  works,  whose  numbers  are  increasing  in 
geometrical  ratio?  Steel  pens  and  steam-presses  have 
multiplied  the  power  of  production,  and  railways  hurry 
books  to  one's  door  as  fast  as  printed;  but  what  has 
increased  the  cerebrum  and  the  cerebellum  ?  The  two  lobes 
of  the  human  brain  are  not  a  whit  larger  to-day  than 
when  Adam  learned  his  ab's  and  eVs  in  the  great  book 
of  nature.  The  spectacles  by  which  we  may  read  two 
books  at  once  are  yet  to  be  invented.  De  Quincey  calcu 
lates  that  if  a  student  were  to  spend  his  entire  life  from 
the  age  of  twenty  to  eighty  in  reading  only,  he  might 
compass  the  mere  reading  of  some  twenty  thousand 
volumes;  but,  as  many  books  should  be  studied  as  well  as 
read,  and  some  read  many  times  over,  he  concludes  that 
five  to  eight  thousand  is  the  largest  number  which  a 
student  in  that  long  life  could  hope  to  master.  What 


PROFESSORSHIPS    OF   BOOKS   AND   BEADING.          145 

realms  of  books,  then,  must  even  the  Alexanders  of  letters 
leave  unconquered!  The  most  robust  and  indefatigable 
reader  who  essays  to  go  through  an  imperial  library  cannot 
extract  the  honey  from  one-twentieth  of  this  hive ;  though 
he  read  from  dawn  to  dark,  he  must  die  in  the  first 
alcoves. 

It  is  true  that,  in  another  view,  the  facts  are  not  quite 
so  discouraging.  Newton  said  that  if  the  earth  could  be 
compressed  into  a  solid  mass,  it  could  be  put  into  a  nut 
shell  ;  and  so,  if  we  could  deduct  from  the  world  of  books  all 
the  worthless  ones  and  all  those  that  are  merely  repetitions, 
commentaries,  or  dilutions  of  the  thoughts  of  others,  we 
should  find  it  shrunk  into  a  comparatively  small  compass. 
The  learned  Huet,  who  read  incessantly  till  he  was  ninety- 
one,  and  knew  more  of  books  perhaps  than  any  other  man 
down  to  his  time,  thought  that  if  nothing  had  been  said 
twice,  everything  that  had  ever  been  written  since  the 
creation  of  the  world,  the  details  of  history  excepted,  might 
be  put  into  nine  or  ten  folio  volumes.  Still,  after  all  de 
ductions  have  been  made,  the  residuum  of  printed  matter 
which  one  would  like  to  read  is  so  great  as  to  be  absolutely 
terrifying.  The  use  of  books  is  to  stimulate  and  replenish 
the  mind,  to  give  it  stuff  to  work  with, —  ideas,  facts,  senti 
ments;  but  to  be  deluged  with  these  is  as  bad  as  to  lack 
them.  A  mill  will  not  go  if  there  is  too  little  water,  but  it 
will  be  as  effectually  stopped  if  there  is  too  much.  The 
day  of  encyclopaedic  scholarship  has  gone  by.  Even  that 
ill-defined  creature,  "  a  well-informed  man,"  is  becoming 
every  year  more  and  more  rare;  but  the  Huets  and  the 
Scaligers, — the  Bacons,  who "  take  all  knowledge  to  be 
their  province,"  and  the  Leibnitzes,  who  presume  "  to 
drive  all  the  sciences  abreast," — must  soon  become  as 
7 


146          PROFESSOKSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   BEADING. 

extinct  as  the  megatherium  or  the  ichthyosaurus.  The 
most  ambitious  reader  who  now  indulges  in  what  Sydney- 
Smith  calls  the  foppery  of  universality,  speedily  learns 
that  no  individual  can  grasp  in  the  limits  of  a  lifetime 
even  an  elementary  knowledge  of  the  many  provinces  of 
old  learning,  enlarged  as  they  are  by  the  vast  annexations 
of  modern  discovery;  and,  like  Voltaire's  little  man  of 
Saturn,  who  lived  only  during  five  hundred  revolutions, 
or  fifteen  thousand  of  our  years,  he  complains,  as  he 
closes  his  career,  that  scarcely  has  he  begun  to  pick  up 
a  little  knowledge  before  he  is  called  on  to  depart. 

For  all  these  reasons  we  cannot  but  think  that  our 
colleges,  while  they  provide  the  student  with  libraries, 
should  also  provide  him  with  a  professor  of  books  and 
reading.  It  is  not  enough  to  introduce  him  to  these  quar 
ries  of  knowledge;  he  should  also  be  taught  where  to  sink 
his  shafts  and  how  to  work  them.  Mr.  Emerson,  speaking 
of  such  a  professorship  in  one  of  his  later  essays,  says: 
"  I  think  no  r  hair  is  so  much  wanted."  Even  the  ripest 
scholar  is  puzzled  to  decide  what  books  he  shall  read 
among  the  myriads  that  clamor  for  his  attention.  What, 
then,  must  be  the  perplexity  of  one  who  has  just  entered 
the  fields  of  literature!  If  in  Bacon's  time  some  books 
were  "  to  be  tasted,  others  to  be  swallowed,  and  some  few 
to  be  chewed  and  digested,"  how  much  greater  must 
seem  the  necessity  of  discrimination  at  this  day,  when  the 
amount  of  literary  pabulum  has  quadrupled  and  even 
quintupled!  Is  there  not  then  an  absolute  necessity  that 
the  student  who  would  economize  his  time  and  make  the 
best  use  of  his  opportunities,  should  be  guided  in  his 
reading  by  a  competent  adviser?  Will  it  be  said  that, 
according  to  the  theory  of  a  collegiate  education,  the 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING.          147 

studies  of  the  curriculum  will  demand  all  his  time;  that 
he  will  have  no  spare  hours  for  general  culture?  We 
reply  that,  as  a  matter  of  fact,  whatever  the  theory,  in 
no  college  does  the  student,  as  a  rule,  give  his  whole 
time  to  the  regular  lessons,  however  long  or  difficult. 
Unless  very  dull  or  poorly  prepared,  the  student  does 
find  time  to  read, —  often  several  hours  a  day, —  and  he 
is  generally  encouraged  to  do  so  by  the  professors.  The 
question,  therefore,  is  not  whether  he  shall  concentrate 
all  his  time  and  attention  upon  his  text-books,  but 
whether  he  shall  read  instructive  books,  for  a  definite 
purpose  and  under  competent  direction,  or  shall  acquire, 
without  direction,  the  merest  odds  and  ends  of  knowledge. 
We  live  in  a  day  when  it  is  the  practice  in  every 
calling  to  utilize  things  which  were  once  deemed  value 
less.  In  some  of  the  great  cities  of  Europe  even  the 
sweepings  of  the  streets  are  turned  to  account,  being  sold 
to  contractors  who  use  them  as  dressing  for  farms.  In 
the  United  States  Mint  at  Philadelphia  the  visitor  to  the 
gold  room  notices  a  rack  placed  over  the  floor  for  him 
to  walk  on;  on  inquiring  its  purpose,  he  is  told  that  it 
is  to  prevent  the  visitor  from  carrying  away  with  the 
dust  of  his  feet  the  minute  particles  of  precious  metal 
which,  in  spite  of  the  utmost  care,  will  fall  upon  the 
floor  when  the  rougher  edges  of  the  bar  are  filed,  and 
that  the  sweepings  of  the  building  save  yearly  thousands 
of  dollars.  How  much  more  precious  are  the  minute 
fragments  of  time  which  are  wasted  by  the  young,  especi 
ally  by  those  who  are  toiling  in  the  mints  of  knowledge! 
Who  can  estimate  the  value  to  a  college  student  of  this 
golden  dust,  these  raspings  and  parings  of  life,  these 
leavings  of  days  and  remnants  of  hours,  so  valueless 


148          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

singly,  so  inestimable  in  the  aggregate,  could  they  be 
gleaned  up  and  turned  to  mental  improvement!  Let  us 
suppose  that  a  young  man,  on  entering  college,  econo 
mizes  the  odds  and  ends  of  his  time  so  far  as  to  read 
thoughtfully  twelve  pages  of  history  a  day.  This  would 
amount,  omitting  Sundays,  to  about  three  thousand  seven 
hundred  pages,  or  twelve  volumes  of  over  three  hundred 
pages  each,  in  a  year.  At  the  end  of  his  college  course 
he  would  have  read  forty-eight  volumes, —  enough  to  have 
made  him  master  of  all  the  leading  facts,  with  much  of 
the  philosophy,  of  history;  with  the  great,  paramount 
works  of  English  literature;  with  the  masterpieces  (in 
translations)  of  French,  German,  Spanish,  and  Italian 
literature,  and  with  not  a  little  of  the  choicest  periodical 
literature  of  the  day.  What  a  fund  of  knowledge,  of 
wisdom,  and  of  inspiration  would  these  forty- eight  vol 
umes,  well  chosen,  well  understood,  and  well  digested,  be 
to  him!  What  a  quickening,  bracing,  and  informing 
study  would  even  one  great  book  prove!  The  histories  of 
Hallam,  Grote,  Merivale,  Mommsen,  Milman,  Macaulay, 
Motley;  Clarendon's  gallery  of  portraits,  Gibbon's  great 
historic  painting;  any  one  of  these  might  date  an  epoch 
in  the  student's  intellectual  life.  The  thorough,  consci 
entious  study  of  any  masterpiece  of  literature,  Dr.  John 
son  thought,  wo  aid  make  a  man  a  dangerous  intellectual 
antagonist.  Over  and  above  all  this,  the  student  would 
have  formed  habits  of  self-improvement  and  of  economy 
in  the  use  of  his  time  which  would  be  of  more  value 
than  his  acquisitions,  and  would  influence  his  whole  life. 
In  saying  this  we  do  not  forget  that  it  is  not  well  for 
the  intellectual  worker  to  be  always  in  the  harness,  or 
to  be  a  slave  to  the  clock.  We  have  no  sympathy  with 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS    AND   READING.          149 

those  persons  who,  with  a  pair  of  compasses,  divide  the 
day  into  portions,  alloting  one  portion  and  no  more  to 
one  thing,  and  another  portion  to  another,  and  who  think 
it  a  sin  to  lose  a  minute.  On  the  contrary,  we  believe 
there  is  a  profound  truth  in  the  saying  of  Tillier  that 
"le  temps  le  mieux  employe  est  celui  que  Ton  perd." 
Much  of  our  education,  even  of  our  best  education,  is 
acquired,  not  only  out  of  school,  but  out  of  the  study, 
in  the  hours  which  morbid  or  mechanical  workers  con 
sider  lost.  Deduct  from  our  acquisitions  all  that  is 
learned  in  seemingly  idle  hours,  in  times  of  recreation 
and  social  intercourse,  and  the  residuum  would  be  a  heap 
of  bones  without  flesh  to  cover  them.  Making,  however, 
all  deductions  for  necessary  rest  and  relaxation,  we  still 
believe  there  are  few  students  who  cannot  find  time  to 
read  twelve  pages  a  day.  Are  there  not  many  who  through 
ignorance  of  what  to  read,  and  how  to  read,  and  even  of 
the  chief  advantages  of  reading,  waste  double  this  time? 
Will  it  be  said  that  it  is  enough  for  the  student  to 
read  a  few  choice  authors, —  to  absorb  thoroughly  a  half- 
dozen  or  more  representative  books, —  and  that  these  he 
can  select  for  himself  ?  No  doubt  there  are  advantages 
in  thus  limiting  one's  reading.  So  far  as  reading  is  not 
a  pastime,  but  a  part  of  the  systematic  cultivation  of  the 
faculties,  it  is  useful  only  so  far  as  it  implies  close  and 
intimate  knowledge.  The  mind  should  be  not  a  vessel 
only,  but  a  vat.  A  man  may  say  that  he  has  read  Mil 
ton's  minor  poems,  if  he  has  skimmed  over  them  lightly 
as  he  would  skim  over  the  columns  of  a  newspaper,  or 
if  he  dispatches  them  as  a  person  boasted  that  he  had 
gone  through  a  geometry  in  one  afternoon,  only  skipping 
the  A's,  and  B's,  and  crooked  lines  that  seemed  to  have 


150          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

been  thrown  in  to  intercept  his  progress;  but  he  has  not 
read  them  to  any  good  purpose  until  they  have  fascinated 
his  imagination  and  sunk  into  his  memory.  Really  great 
books  must  be  read  and  re-read  with  ceaseless  iteration, 
must  be  chewed  and  digested  till  they  are  thoroughly 
assimilated,  till  their  ideas  pass  like  the  iron  atoms  of 
the  blood  into  the  mental  constitution;  and  they  hardly 
begin  to  give  weight  and  power  to  the  intellect,  till  we 
have  them  so  by  heart  that  we  scarcely  need  to  look  into 
them.  It  is  not  in  the  number  of  facts  one  has  read 
that  his  intellectual  power  lies,  but  in  the  number  he 
can  bring  to  bear  on  a  given  subject,  and  in  his  ability 
to  treat  them  as  data,  or  factors  of  a  new  product,  in  an 
endless  series. 

It  is  hardly  possible  to  censure  too  sharply  what  Sir 
William  Hamilton  calls  "  the  prevailing  pestilence  of 
slovenly,  desultory,  effeminate  reading."  A  great  deal 
of  the  time  thus  spent  is  but  the  indulgence  of  intel 
lectual  dram-drinking,  affording  a  temporary  exhilaration, 
but  ultimately  emasculating  both  mind  and  character. 
The  Turk  eats  opium,  the  Hindoo  chews  tobacco  and 
betel  nut,  the  civilized  Christian  reads;  and  opium,  tobacco, 
and  books,  all  alike  tend  to  produce  that  dizzy,  dreamy, 
drowsy  state  of  mind  which  unfits  a  man  for  all  the 
active  duties  of  life.  But  true  as  all  this  is,  "  the  man 
of  one  book,11  or  of  a  few  books,  is,  we  fear,  a  Utopian 
dream  rather  than  a  reality,  in  this  nineteenth  century. 
The  young  man  who  has  a  keen,  vigorous  appetite  for 
knowledge,  and  who  would  be  abreast  with  his  age,  will 
never  be  content  to  feed  on  a  few  choice  authors,  even 
though  each  be  a  library.  He  knows  that  as  the  Ama 
zon  and  the  Mississippi  have  hundreds  of  tributaries,  so 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING.          151 

it  is  with  every  great  stream  of  knowledge.  He  sees  that 
such  are  the  interrelations  and  overlappings  of  science 
that,  to  know  one  subject  well,  it  is  necessary  to  know 
something  of  a  thousand  others.  He  recognizes,  sooner 
or  later,  the  fact  that,  as  Maclaurin  says,  "  our  knowledge 
is  vastly  greater  than  the  sum  of  what  all  its  objects 
separately  could  afford;  and  when  a  new  object  comes 
within  our  reach,  the  addition  to  our  knowledge  is  the 
greater  the  more  we  already  know;  so  that  it  increases, 
not  as  the  new  objects  increase,  but  in  a  much  higher 
proportion."  Above  all,  he  knows  that,  as  in  our  animal 
economy  it  is  a  disastrous  policy  to  eat  exclusively  the 
nitrates  which  contribute  to  the  muscles,  the  phosphates 
which  feed  the  brain  and  nerves,  or  the  carbonates  which 
develop  fat,  so  we  starve  a  part  of  our  mental  faculties 
if  we  limit  our  mental  diet  to  a  few  dishes.  The  intel 
lectual  epicure  who  would  feed  on  a  few  choice  authors 
is  usually  the  laudator  temporis  acti, —  the  indiscriminate 
eulogist  of  the  past;  and  this,  of  itself,  renders  worthless 
all  his  recipes  for  mental  culture,  and  cuts  him  off  from 
the  sympathy  of  the  young.  He  is  forever  advising  them 
to  read  only  classic  authors,  which  would  be  to  live  in 
an  intellectual  monastery.  It  is  quite  possible  to  feed  a 
young  man  with  too  concentrated  a  diet.  It  has  been 
truly  said  by  a  wise  teacher  that  if  there  is  one  law  more 
sure  than  another  in  intellectual  development,  it  is  that 
the  young  must  take  their  start  in  thought  and  in  taste 
from  the  models  of  their  own  time;  from  the  men  whose 
fame  has  not  become  a  tradition,  but  is  ringing  in  clear 
and  loud  notes  in  the  social  atmosphere  around  us. 

There  are  some  persons,  no  doubt,  who  are  opposed  to 
all  guidance  of  the  young  in  their  reading.     They  would 


152          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

turn  the  student  loose  into  a  vast  library  and  let  him 
browse  freely  in  whatever  literary  pastures  may  please 
him.  With  Johnson  they  say,  "  Whilst  you  stand  deliber 
ating  which  book  your  son  shall  read  first,  another  boy 
has  read  both;  read  anything  five  hours  a  day,  and  you 
will  soon  be  learned.1'  Counsel,  advice  in  the  choice  of 
books,  they  condemn  as  interfering  with  the  freedom  of 
individual  taste  and  the  spontaneity  which  is  the  condition 
of  intellectual  progress.  "  Read,"  they  say  to  the  young 
man,  "what  you  can  read  with  a  keen  and  lively  relish; 
what  charms,  thrills,  or  fascinates  you;  what  stimulates 
and  inspires  your  mind,  or  satisfies  your  intellectual 
hunger;  'in  brief,  sir,  study  what  you  most  affect.'"  No 
doubt  there  is  a  vein  of  wisdom  in  this  advice.  It  is  quite 
possible  to  order  one's  reading  by  too  strict  and  formal  a 
rule.  A  youth  will  continue  to  study  only  that  in  which 
he  feels  a  real  interest  and  pleasure,  constantly  provoking 
him  to  activity.  It  is  not  the  books  which  others  like, 
or  which  they  deem  best  fitted  for  him,  that  he  will  read 
and  read  with  profit,  but  the  books  that  hit  his  tastes 
most  exactly  and  that  satisfy  his  intellectual  cravings. 
No  sensible  educator  will  prescribe  the  same  courses  of 
reading  for  two  persons,  or  lay  down  any  formal,  cast- 
iron  rules  for  the  direction  of  the  mental  processes.  That 
which  is  the  most  nutritious  aliment  of  one  mind  may 
prove  deleterious  and  even  poisonous  to  another. 

To  some  extent,  too,  the  choice  of  books  may  be  left 
to  individual  taste  and  judgment.  There  will  be  times 
when,  under  the  attraction  of  a  particular  subject,  or  the 
magnetism  of  a  particular  author,  it  may  be  advisable  to 
break  away  from  the  prescribed  list,  and  follow  the 
thoughtful  promptings  of  nature.  That  must  be  a  sorry 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND    READING.          153 

tameness  of  intellect  that  feels  no  impulse  to  get  out  of 
the  groove  of  even  the  most  judicious  course  of  reading. 
Again,  there  are  some  minds  that  have  an  eclectic  quality 
which  inclines  them  to  the  reading  they  require,  and  in  a 
library  they  not  only  instinctively  pounce  upon  the  books 
they  need,  but  draw  at  once  from  them  the  most  valu 
able  ideas  as  the  magnet  draws  the  iron  filings  scattered 
through  a  heap  of  sand.  But  these  are  rare  cases,  and 
can  furnish  no  rule  for  general  guidance.  To  assert  that 
a  learned  and  judicious  adviser  cannot  help  the  ordinary 
student  in  the  choice  of  books,  is  to  assert  that  all  teach 
ing  is  valueless.  If  inspiration,  genius,  taste,  elective 
affinities  are  sufficient  in  the  selection  and  reading  of 
books,  why  not  also  in  the  choice  of  college  studies? 
Why  adopt  a  curriculum?  The  truth  is,  the  literary 
appetite  of  the  young  is  often  feeble,  and  oftener  capri 
cious  or  perverted.  While  their  stomachs  generally  reject 
unwholesome  food,  their  minds  often  feed  on  garbage  and 
even  poison.  The  majority  of  young  persons  are  fond  of 
labor-saving  processes  and  short  cuts  to  knowledge,  and 
have  little  taste  for  books  which  put  much  strain  upon  the 
mind.  The  knowledge  too  easily  acquired  may  impart 
a  temporary  stimulus  and  a  kind  of  intellectual  keen 
ness  and  cleverness,  but  it  orings  no  solid  advantage. 
It  is,  in  fact,  "  the  merest  epicurism  of  intelligence, — 
sensuous,  but  certainly  not  intellectual."  Magnify  as  we 
may  the  necessity  of  regarding  individual  peculiarities 
in  education,  it  is  certain  that  genius,  inspiration,  or 
an  affinity  for  any  kind  of  knowledge,  does  not  necessarily 
exclude  self-knowledge,  self-criticism,  or  self-control.  As 
another  has  said:  "If  the  genius  of  a  man  lies  in  the 
development  of  the  individual  person  that  he  is,  his  man- 


154         PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

hood  lies  in  finding  out  by  study  what  he  is,  and  what  he 
may  become,  and  in  wisely  using  the  means  that  are  fitted 
to  form  and  perfect  his  individuality." 

Will  it  be  said  that  there  are  manuals  or  "  courses  of 
reading,"  such  as  Pycroft's,  or  President  Porter's  excellent 
work,  by  the  aid  of  which  an  undergraduate  may  select 
his  books  without  the  aid  of  a  professor?  We  answer  that 
such  manuals,  while  they  are  often  serviceable,  can  never 
do  the  work  of  a  living  guide  and  adviser.  Books  can 
never  teach  the  use  of  books.  No  course  of  reading,  how 
ever  ideally  good,  can  be  exactly  adapted  to  all  minds. 
Every  student  has  his  idiosyncrasies,  his  foibles,  his  "  stond 
or  impediment  in  the  wit,"  as  Bacon  terms  it,  which  must 
be  considered  in  choosing  his  reading-matter,  so  that  not 
only  his  tastes  may  be  in  some  degree  consulted,  but  "  every 
defect  of  the  mind  may  have  a  special  receipt." 

Will  it  be  objected  to  our  plan,  that  a  vast  majority  of 
American  colleges  are  ill  endowed,  and  cannot  afford  to 
have  a  Professorship  of  Books  and  Reading,  however  de 
sirable?  We  reply  that  such  a  chair,  specially  endowed, 
is  not  indispensable;  but  that  its  duties,  in  the  smaller 
colleges,  might  be  discharged  by  the  professor  of  English 
Literature,  or  by  an  accomplished  librarian. 

But,  it  may  be  asked,  what  are  the  qualifications,  and 
what  will  be  the  duties,  of  such  a  literary  gustator  and 
guide?  We  reply  that  a  professor  of  books  and  reading 
should  be  a  man  of  broad  and  varied  culture,  with  cath 
olic  tastes,  a  thorough  knowledge  of  bibliography,  espe 
cially  of  critical  literature,  and  much  knowledge  of  men; 
one  who  can  readily  detect  the  peculiarities  of  his  pupils, 
and  who,  in  directing  their  reading,  will  have  constant 
reference  to  these  as  well  as  to  the  order  of  nature  and 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF    BOOKS   AND    READING.          155 

intellectual  development.  While  he  may  prepare,  from 
time  to  time,  courses  of  reading  on  special  topics,  and  espe 
cially  on  those  related  to  the  college  studies,  he  will  be  still 
more  useful  in  advising  the  student  how  to  read  most  advan 
tageously;  in  what  ways  to  improve  the  memory;  how  to 
keep  and  use  commonplace  books;  when  to  make  abstracts; 
and  in  giving  many  other  hints  which  books  on  reading 
never  communicate,  and  which  suggest  themselves  only  to 
one  who  has  learned  after  many  years  of  experience  and 
by  many  painful  mistakes  the  secret  of  successful  study. 
He  will  see  that  the  young  men  who  look  to  him  as  their 
guide  read  broadly  and  liberally,  yet  care  "  multum  legere 
potius  quam  multa"  He  will  see  that  they  cultivate  "  the 
pleasure  grounds  as  well  as  the  corn  fields  of  the  mind"; 
that  they  read  not  only  the  most  famous  books,  but  the 
best  reputed  current  works  on  each  subject;  that  they  read 
by  subjects,  and  not  by  authors;  perusing  a  book  not  be 
cause  it  is  the  newest  or  the  oldest,  but  because  it  is  the 
very  one  they  need  to  help  them  on  to  the  next  stage  of 
their  inquiries ;  and  that  they  practice  subsoil  plowing  by 
re-reading  the  masterpieces  of  genius  again  and  again. 
Encouraging  them  to  read  the  books  they  "  do  honestly 
feel  a  wish  and  curiosity  to  read,"  he  will  teach  them  to 
discriminate,  nevertheless,  between  true  desire,  the  moni 
tion  of  nature,  and  that  superficial,  false  desire  after 
spiceries  and  confectioneries,  which,  as  Carlyle  says,  is 
"  so  often  mistaken  for  the  real  appetite,  lying  far  deeper, 
far  quieter,  after  solid  nutritive  food";  and,  discouraging 
short  cuts  in  general,  he  will  yet  often  save  the  student 
days  of  labor  by  pointing  out  some  masterly  review  article 
in  which  is  condensed  into  a  few  pages  the  quintessence 
of  many  volumes. 


156          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND   READING. 

Perhaps  one  of  the  greatest,  services  which  such  a 
teacher  might  perform  for  the  undergraduate  would  be 
in  showing  him  how  to  economize  his  reading, —  how  to 
transfer  or  inspirit  into  his  brain  the  contents  of  a  good 
book  in  the  briefest  time.  At  this  day,  the  art  of  read 
ing,  or  at  least  one  of  the  arts,  is  to  skip  judiciously, — 
to  omit  all  that  does  not  concern  us,  while  missing  noth 
ing  that  we  really  need.  Some  of  the  best  thinkers  rarely 
begin  a  book  at  the  beginning,  but  dive  right  into  the 
middle,  read  enough  to  seize  the  leading  idea,  dig  out 
the  heart  of  it,  and  then  throw  it  by.  In  this  way  a 
volume  which  cost  the  author  five  years  of  'toil,  they  will 
devour  at  a  night's  sitting,  with  as  much  ease  as  a  spider 
would  suck  the  juices  of  a  fly,  leaving  the  wings  and  legs 
in  the  shape  of  a  preface,  appendix,  notes,  and  conclusion 
for  a  boiled  joint  the  next  day.  It  is  said  that  Patrick 
Henry  read  with  such  rapidity  that  he  seemed  only  to 
run  his  eye  down  the  pages  of  a  book,  often  to  leap  over 
the  leaves,  seldom  to  go  regularly  through  any  passage; 
and  yet,  when  he  had  dashed  through  a  volume  in  this 
race-horse  way,  he  knew  its  contents  better  than  anybody 
else.  Stories  similar  to  this  of  "the  forest-born  Demos 
thenes"  are  told  of  some  of  his  contemporaries.  Won 
ders  are  recounted  of  their  powers  of  perusal;  how 
Johnson  would  swoop  down  upon  his  prey  like  the  eagle, 
and  tear  out  the  heart  of  a  book  at  once;  how  Burke, 
reading  a  book  as  if  he  were  never  to  see  it  again,  de 
voured  two  octavo  volumes  in  a  stage-coach;  and  how 
package  after  package  of  these  sweet  medicines  of  the 
mind  were  thrown  in  to  Napoleon  on  the  island  of  St. 
Helena,  like  food  to  a  lion,  and  with  hoc  presto  dis 
patched.  It  is  said  that  Coleridge  rarely  read  a  book 


PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND    READING.          157 

through,  but  would  plunge  into  the  marrow  of  a  new 
volume,  and  feed  on  all  the  nutritious  matter  with  sur 
prising  rapidity,  grasping  the  thought  of  the  author,  and 
following  out  his  reasonings  to  consequences  of  which  he 
had  never  dreamed. 

Chief-Justice  Parsons,  of  Massachusetts,  who,  according 
to  Chief-Justice  Parker,  "  knew  more  law  than  anybody 
else,  and  knew  more  of  other  things  than  he  did  of  law," 
read  books  with  a  similar  rapidity,  taking  in  the  mean 
ing  not  by  single  words  but  by  whole  sentences,  which 
enabled  him  to  finish  several  books  in  a  single  evening. 
Thierry,  the  historian,  tells  us  of  himself  that  from  the 
habit  of  devouring  long  pages  in  folio,  in  order  to  ex 
tract  a  phrase  and  sometimes  one  word  among  a  thou 
sand,  he  acquired  a  faculty  which  astonished  him, —  that 
of  reading  in  some  way  by  intuition,  and  of  encountering 
almost  immediately  the  passage  that  would  be  useful  to 
him, — -all  the  vital  power  seeming  to  tend  toward  a  single 
vital  point.  Carlyle  devours  books  in  the  same  wholesale 
way,  plucking  out  from  an  ordinary  volume  "the  heart 
of  its  mystery  "  in  two  hours.  It  is  absurd,  of  course,  to 
suppose  that  every  man, —  above  all,  that  young  men, — 
will  be  able  with  profit  to  dash  through  books  as  did 
these  great  men;  but  all  students  can  be  taught  how,  by 
practice,  to  come  nearer  and  nearer  to  such  a  habit.  It 
is  a  miserable  bondage  to  be  compelled  to  read  all  the 
words  in  a  book  to  learn  what  is  in  it.  A  vigorous,  live 
mind  will  fly  ahead  of  the  words  of  an  author  and  antic 
ipate  his  thought.  Instead  of  painfully  traversing  the  • 
vales  of  commonplace,  it  will  leap  from  peak  to  peak  on 
the  summit  of  his  ideas.  Great  quickness,  acuteness.  and 
power  of  concentration  are  required  to  do  this;  but  it  is 


158          PROFESSORSHIPS   OF   BOOKS   AND    READING. 

a  faculty  susceptible  of  cultivation  and  measurably  attain 
able  by  all.  The  first  thing  to  be  learned  by  every  stu 
dent  is  how  to  read.  Few  know  how,  because  few  have 
made  it  a  study.  Many  read  a  book  as  if  they  had  taken 
a  sacramentum  militare  to  follow  the  author  through  all 
his  platitudes  and  twaddle.  Like  the  American  sloth, 
they  begin  at  the  top  of  the  tree,  and  never  leave  it  till 
they  have  devoured  all  of  which  they  can  strip  it,  whether 
leaves  or  fruit.  Others  read  languidly,  without  re-acting 
on  the  author  or  challenging  his  statements,  when  the 
pulse  should  beat  high,  as  if  they  were  in  battle  and  the 
sound  of  the  trumpet  were  in  their  ears.  We  are  told  by 
Dr.  0.  W.  Holmes,  who  was  a  classmate  of  the  late  Dr. 
H.  B.  Hackett,  that  when  the  latter  was  at  Phillips  Acad 
emy,  Andover,  he  "  fastened  his  eyes  upon  a  book  as  if  it 
were  a  will  making  him  heir  to  a  million."  A  reader 
who  is  thus  enthusiastic,  and  knows  the  secret  of  his  art, 
will  get  through  a  book  in  far  less  time,  and  master  it 
more  thoroughly  than  another,  who,  ignorant  of  the  art, 
has  plodded  through  every  page. 


THE  MORALITY  OF  GOOD  LIVING-. 


E  science  of  cookery,  which  has  so  long  been  neg- 
lected  by  Americans,  is  beginning  at  last  to  provoke 
their  attention.  The  labors  of  Professor  Blot  mark  an 
epoch  in  our  dietetic  history.  In  lectures  and  magazine 
essays  he  has  taught  us  how  to  eat,  and,  as  pre-essential 
to  it,  how  to  roast,  fry,  and  boil;  and  the  lessons  are  of 
vital  importance  to  our  health  and  vigor  as  a  people. 
Englishmen  and  Americans  have  too  long  regarded  the  art 
and  mystery  of  cooking  with  contempt,  as  beneath  the  dig 
nity  of  a  cultivated,  high-minded  m?an.  But  good  cookery 
is  only  another  name  for  economy,  health,  temperance  and 
longevity;  and  what  can  be  more  inconsistent  than  to 
require  a  diploma  of  the  man  who  professes  to  cure  the 
diseases  caused  by  vile  cookery,  and  to  regard  him  as 
eminently  respectable,  and  yet  to  allow  quacks  and  em 
pirics, —  the  most  slovenly  and  uninstructed  persons  in 
the  community, —  to  create  them? 

That  a  man's  energy,  happiness,  and  even  goodness,  are 
dependent  more  or  less  upon  his  bodily  condition,  and  con 
sequently  upon  the  condition  of  his  stomach,  few  persons  at 
this  day  will  hesitate  to  admit.  "  A  sound  mind  in  a  sound 
body  "  is  a  condition,  not  only  of  healthy  intellectual,  but 
of  healthy  spiritual  life.  Hippocrates  went  so  far  as  to 
assert  that  all  men  are  born  with  equal  capacity,  and  that 
the  mental  differences  in  men  are  owing  to  the  different 
kinds  of  foods  they  consume,  a  theory  which  was  very 

159 


160  THE    MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

plausibly  illustrated  by  the  late  Mr.  Buckle.  A  man  of 
the  kindliest  impulses  has  only  to  feed  upon  indigestible 
food  for  a  few  days,  and  forthwith  his  liver  is  affected,  and 
then  his  brain.  His  sensibilities  are  blunted;  his  uneasi 
ness  makes  him  waspish  and  fretful.  He  is  like  a  hedge 
hog  with  the  quills  rolled  in,  and  will  do  and  say  things 
from  which  in  health  he  would  have  recoiled.  Dr.  John 
son  said  truly  that  "  every  man  is  a  rascal  when  he  is 
sick;'1  and  Sydney  Smith  did  not  exaggerate  when  he 
affirmed  that  "  old  friendships  are  often  destroyed  by 
toasted  cheese,  and  hard  salted  meat  has  often  led  to  sui 
cide."  Who  does  not  know  that  a  nervous  headache,  an 
attack  of  dyspepsia,  a  rheumatic  pain,  even  so  trifling  a 
thing  as  a  cold  in  the  head,  will  often  convert  the  most 
amiable  of  men  into  a  bull-dog?  Even  so  intellectual  a 
man  as  William  Hazlitt,  writing  to  his  lady-love,  could 
say:  "I  never  love  you  so  well  as  when  I  think  of  sit 
ting  down  with  you  to  dinner,  on  a  boiled  scrag-end  of 
mutton  and  hot  potatoes."  The  most  blissful  hours  of 
domestic  life  are  those  most  pervaded  by  the  element  of 
domesticity;  and  no  prudent  wife  will  despise  the  addi 
tional  charm  added  to  the  soothing  effects  of  her  presence 
by  the  influence  of  "  a  boiled  scrag-end  of  mutton  and  hot 
potatoes."  Who  does  not  know  that  one  of  the  secrets  of 
begging  favors  successfully  is  to  ask  for  them  immediately 
after  dinner.  Many  a  man,  who,  before  meal-time,  would 
not  give  a  sixpence  for  any  purpose,  will,  post-prandially, 
talk  with  unction  of  the  miseries  of  our  race,  and  hand  over 
his  greenbacks  without  grumbling.  The  same  person  that 
at  eleven  o'clock  A.M.  repulsed  a  missionary  with  icy  indif 
ference,  and  almost  laughed  the  world's  conversion  to 
scorn,  will  sing  Heber's  hymn  with  feeling,  and  almost 


THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING.  161 

shed  tears  over  the  benighted  condition  of  the  Hottentots 
and  Kickapoos,  at  three  in  the  afternoon.  Is  there  a  lob 
byist  at  Washington  who  is  ignorant  of  the  fact  that  his 
"  little  bill "  is  more  clearly  apprehended  by  a  legislator 
after  his  one  or  two  o'clock  meal;  or  is  there  a  wife  who 
doubts  that  the  way  to  a  man's  heart  is  through  his  stom 
ach?  "He  had  not  dined,"  says  Shakspeare  of  Coriolanus; 
and  to  the  flatulence  and  acerbity  thus  caused  in  the  hero's 
stomach  Menenius  ascribes  his  rejection  of  the  prayers  of 

Rome: 

"He  had  not  dined; 

The  veins  unfilled,  our  blood  is  cold,  and  then 
We  pout  upon  the  morning,  are  unapt 
To  give  or  to  forgive;  but  when  we  have  stuffed 
These  pipes,  and  these  conveyances  of  our  blood, 
With  wine  and  feeding,  we  have  suppler  souls 
Than  in  our  priest-like  fasts." 

The  truth  that  man  is  half-animal  has  too  often  been 
ignored  by  divines  and  moralists.  The  health  which  is 
dependent  upon  a  good  digestion  has  much  more  to  do  with 
a  man's  piety  than  has  generally  been  supposed.  Every 
minister  of  the  Gospel  has  to  grapple  with  cases  of  con 
science  which  baffle  all  ordinary  spiritual  treatment,  and 
which  turn  out  at  last  to  be  simply  cases  of  physical  dis 
order  whose  remedy  is  in  the  pharmacopeia,  or  more  fre 
quently  in  the  larder  or  cook-book.  Constitutional,  hered 
itary,  and  occasional  diseases  are  constantly  at  work, 
modifying  men's  opinions,  feelings,  and  practices.  Dr. 
Mason,  of  New  York,  used  to  say  that  the  grace  that 
would  make  John  look  like  an  angel,  would  be  only  just 
enough  to  keep  Peter  from  knocking  a  man  down.  If 
the  house  of  this  tabernacle  be  shattered,  and  in  constant 
need  of  props  and  repairs,  its  sympathetic  tenant  is  apt 
to  be  like  its  crazy  dwelling-place.  There  are  only  two 


162  THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

bad  things  in  this  world,  said  Hannah  More, —  sin  and  bile. 
Was  she  ignorant  that  a  large  part  of  the  sin  springs  from 
bile? 

The  doctrine  that  health  has  a  great  deal  to  do  with 
godliness  may  not  be  very  flattering  to  our  pride;  but 
we  must  accept  our  natures,  as  the  transcendentalist  did 
"  the  universe,"  and,  accepting  them,  we  must  bow  to  the 
plain  fact  that  a  ladder  reaching  to  Heaven  must,  if  we  are 
to  climb  it,  have  its  feet  upon  the  ground;  and  that,  to 
reach  to  the  highest  degree  of  spiritual  excellence,  we  must 
begin  with  physical  and  mental  soundness.  It  is  an  in 
dubitable  truth  that  a  man  not  only  reasons  better,  but 
loves  more  warmly,  gives  more  generously,  and  prays 
more  fervently,  when  well  than  when  ill.  A  man  of 
unquestionable  piety  once  said  that  he  could  not  worship 
God  until  he  had  eaten  his  breakfast.  It  is  equally  true 
that  a  man  who  is  well  fed,  clothed,  and  housed  is  a  more 
amiable  being  than  one  who  tacks  the  comforts  of  life.  A 
man  before  dinner  may  talk  scandal  or  write  scathing 
criticism;  may  crawl  like  a  horse-fly  over  the  character  or 
the  writings  of  a  neighbor;  but,  after  he  has  well  eaten 
and  drunken,  the  thing  is  an  impossibility.  There  is  some 
thing  in  a  generous  meal  that  exorcises  the  devils  of 
disparagement  and  calumny,  and  substitutes  therefor  the 
spirits  of  good-fellowship  and  philanthropy.  It  may  be 
doubted  whether  half  of  the  suicides,  murders,  heresies, 
false  philosophies,  and  apostacies  that  have  stained  the 
annals  of  our  race,  have  not  had  their  origin  remotely  in 
a  disordered  stomach.  Voltaire  affirms  that  the  massacre 
of  St.  Bartholomew  was  primarily  due  to  the  utter  inca 
pacity  of  the  King  to  digest  his  food.  Had  Josephine 
been  a  good  cook,  perhaps  history  might  have  been  spared 


THE   MORALITY    OF   GOOD    LIVING.  163 

one  of  its  saddest  scandals.  It  is  not  the  "  fat,  sleek- 
headed  man,"  but  the  "lean  and  hungry  Cassius "  that  is 
dangerous. 

As  a  moral  institution,  therefore,  dinner  cannot  be  too 
highly  valued;  but  it  has  also  its  intellectual  aspects. 
Even  the  literature  of  a  nation,  and  its  intellectual 
development  generally,  are  more  or  less  dependent  on  its 
cookery.  It  is  easy  to  assert  that  the  mind  of  an  author 
should  be  independent  of  his  physique, —  that,  being  the 
nobler  part  of  the  man,  it  ought  to  rise  superior  to  the 
trammels  imposed  on  it  by  the  body,  or  external  influ 
ences.  Your  stout,  robustious  persons,  with  nerves  of 
whip-cord  and  frames  of  cast  iron,  cannot  understand 
why  the  delicate,  sensitive  frame  of  the  child  of  genius 
should  be  "  servile  to  every  skyey  influence,1'  as  Shaks- 
peare  calls  it;  or  why  a  man  who  earns  his  bread  and 
butter  by  scribbling  on  foolscap,  should  not  be  able  to 
dash  off  Iliads,  Divine  Comedies,  and  Hamlets  at  all  times 
and  seasons,  just  as  another  man  wields  the  broad-axe, 
handles  the  pitchfork,  or  shoves  the  jack-plane.  It  is, 
nevertheless,  a  stubborn  fact  with  which  literary  men  are 
only  too  familiar,  that  the  flow  and  quality  of  a  man's 
ideas  may  be  affected  by  even  such  vulgar  and  common 
place  things  as  victuals.  The  elder  Kean  understood  so 
well  the  physiological  and  psychological  effects  of  diet, 
that  he  regularly  adapted  his  dinner  to  his  part;  he  ate 
pork  when  he  had  to  play  tyrants;  beef  for  murderers; 
boiled  mutton,  for  lovers.  "Are  you  not  afraid  of  com 
mitting  murder  after  such  a  meal?"  inquired  Byron  of 
Moore,  on  seeing  him  occupied  with  an  underdone  beef 
steak.  Had  Shakspeare  lived  on  corned  beef  and  cabbage, 
he  might  have  produced  the  monster  Caliban,  but  he 


164  THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

could  never  have  conceived  the  delicate  Ariel;  and  had 
Milton  lived  on  pork  and  beans,  ten  chances  to  one  he 
would  have  introduced  the  hog  into  his  description  of 
Paradise.  M.  Esquiros,  an  acute  Spanish  writer,  in  speak 
ing  of  the  English  diet,  expresses  the  opinion  that  beer, 
the  national  drink,  has  inspired  the  English  poets,  their 
artists,  and  their  great  actors: — "The  English,1'  he  adds, 
"  attribute  to  the  use  of  this  liquid  the  iron  muscles  of 
their  laboring  classes,  who  struggle  so  valiantly,  afloat 
and  ashore,  in  factories  and  vessels,  for  the  power  of 
Great  Britain:  they  even  attribute  their  victories  to  it. 
'  Beer  and  wine,'  an  orator  exclaimed  at  a  meeting  where 
I  was  present,  '  met  at  Waterloo :  wine  red  with  fury, 
boiling  over  with  enthusiasm,  mad  with  audacity,  rose. 
thrice  against  that  hill  on  which  stood  a  wall  of  immov 
able  men.  the  sons  of  beer.  You  have  read  history:  beer 
gained  the  day.' " 

Be  this  doctrine  true,  or  the  opposite,  that  "  he  who 
drinks  beer  thinks  beer,"  the  conclusion  still  follows  that  a 
man's  thinking  is  more  or  less  affected  by  his  food.  Some 
of  the  most  anomalous  events  in  history,  including  great 
political  revolutions,  have  had  their  origin  in  the  dis 
ordered  stomachs  of  kings  and  statesmen.  The  finest 
poets  and  prose  writers  that  have  charmed  the  world  by 
their  pens',  have  been  mentally  prostrated  by  a  fit  of 
indigestion;  and  generals  who  have  proclaimed  their  pre 
eminence  at  the  cannon's  mouth  have  been  rendered 
powerless  by  a  badly-cooked  dish.  Could  we  know  the 
full  history  of  all  victories,  ancient  and  modern,  we 
should  probably  be  amazed  to  find  how  important  a  part 
in  the  destiny  of  Empires  has  been  played  by  the  gastric 
juice.  The  fears  of  the  brave,  as  well  as  the  follies  of 


THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD    LIVING.  165 

the  wise,  may  often  be  resolved  into  an  overtaxed  biliary 
duct.  Napoleon  lost  a  battle  one  day  because  his  poulet  a 
la  Marengo  was  inconsiderably  scorched  by  his  chef-de- 
cuisine.  Indigestion,  caused  by  his  fast  and  voracious  mode 
of  eating,  paralyzed  him  in  two  of  the  most  critical  events 
of  his  life, —  the  battle  of  Borodino  and  the  battle  of  Leip- 
sic, —  which  he  might  have  converted  into  decisive  and 
commanding  victories  had  he  pushed  his  advantages  as  he 
was  wont.  On  the  third  day  of  Dresden,  too,  the  German 
novelist,  Hoffman,  who  was  present  in  the  town,  asserts 
that  the  Emperor  would  have  won  far  more  brilliant  suc 
cesses  but  for  the  effects  of  a  shoulder  of  mutton  stuffed 
with  onions.  It  was  owing  in  a  great  degree  to  the 
wretched  condition  of  their  commissariat  that  the  Aus- 
trians  were  defeated  at  Austerlitz.  C'est  la  soupe  qui  fait 
le  soldat. 

"  Let  us  eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  may  die,1'  is 
a  motto  which  has  often  been  denounced,  and  most  justly, 
by  the  Christian  moralist.  "  Let  us  eat  and  drink  well, 
lest  to-morrow  we  die,"  would  be  a  good  substitute. 
The  pleasures  of  the  table  are  not  the  highest  form  of 
human  enjoyment,  it  is  true;  but  for  all  that,  an  oyster- 
pie  is  a  good  thing  when  well  made.  "A  man,"  says  Dr. 
Johnson,  "  who  has  no  regard  for  his  stomach,  will  have 
no  regard  for  anything  else."  We  fully  agree  with  the 
great  moralist,  and  we  subscribe  no  less  heartily  to  the 
saying  of  the  French  magistrate,  of  whom  regenerated 
France,  according  to  Eoyer-Collard,  has  so  much  reason 
to  be  proud,*  who  declared  that  the  discovery  of  a  new 
dish  is  more  important  than  the  discovery  of  a  new  star, 
because  there  never  can  be  dishes  enough,  but  there  are 

*  M.  Henrion  de  Pensey,  President  of  the  Court  of  Cassation. 


166  THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

stars  enough  already.  Justly  did  Talleyrand  inveigh 
against  the  English,  that  they  had  one  hundred  and  fifty 
forms  of  religion,  and  but  one  sauce, —  melted  butter.  It 
is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  only  brainless  men,  with 
full  paunches  and  empty  pates,  have  a  keen  relish  for 
the  luxuries  of  the  table, —  that,  as  Shakspeare  says, 

u Dainty  bits 

Make  rich  the  ribs,  but  bankrupt  quite  the  wits." 

The  celebrated  scholar,  Dr.  Parr,  confessed  a  love  for  "  hot 
lobsters,  with  a  profusion  of  shrimp  sauce."  Pope  was  a 
decided  epicure,  and  would  lie  in  bed  for  days  at  Boling- 
broke's,  unless  he  were  told  that  there  were  stewed  lam 
preys  for  dinner,  when  he  would  rise  instantly  and  hurry 
down  to  table.  Cleopatra  is  said  to  have  owed  her  empire 
over  Caesar  as  much  to  her  suppers  as  to  her  beauty;  and 
who  can  tell  how  much  the  love  of  the  Grand  Monarque, 
Louis  XIV,  for  Madame  de  Maintenon,  was  owing  to  the 
invention  of  the  immortal  cutlets  which  bear  her  name? 
Henry  VIII  was  so  grateful  to  the  inventor  of  a  dish  whose 
flavor  he  relished,  that  he  gave  him  a  manor.  Cardinal 
Wolsey  was  conciliated  by  the  good  dishes  on  the  Field  of 
the  Cloth  of  Gold;  and  Agrippina  won  Claudius  by  a  recipe 
for  dressing  Spanish  onions.  Handel  ate  enormously;  and, 
when  he  dined  at  a  tavern,  always  ordered  dinner  for  three. 
On  being  told  that  all  would  be  ready  as  soon  as  the  com 
pany  should  arrive,  he  would  exclaim:  "Den  bring  up  de 
dinner,  prestissimo.  I  am  de  company." 

It  is  said  that  Cambaceres,  second  consul  under  the 
French  republic,  and  arch-chancellor  under  the  empire, 
never,  under  any  circumstances,  suffered  the  cares  of  gov 
ernment  to  distract  his  attention  from  "  the  great  object 
of  life," —  a  good  dinner.  Being  detained,  on  one  occasion, 


THE   MOKALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING.  167 

when  consulting  with  Napoleon,  beyond  the  appointed  hoar 
of  dinner,  he  betrayed  great  symptoms  of  restlessness  and 
impatience.  At  last  he  wrote  a  note,  which  he  called  a 
gentleman  usher  in  waiting  to  carry.  Napoleon,  suspect 
ing  the  contents,  nodded  to  an  aide-de-camp  to  intercept 
the  despatch.  As  he  took  it,  Cambace*res  begged  earnestly 
that  his  majesty  would  not  read  a  trifling  note  on  family 
matters.  Napoleon  persisted,  and  found  it  to  be  a  note  to 
the  chancellor's  cook,  containing  only  these  words:  "  Gardez 
les  entremets, —  les  rotis  sont  perdus" 

It  is  sometimes  said  that  "  plain  living  and  high  think 
ing"  should  be  the  motto  of  the  scholar.  The  plain  fact 
is,  that,  of  all  laborers,  none  more  imperiously  need  a 
nutritious  diet  than  the  toilers  with  the  brain.  If  there 
is  any  system  of  living  which  they  should  hold  in  horror, 
it  is  the  bran-bread  and  pea-soup  philosophy  inculcated  by 
Graham,  Alcott  and  Co.,  and  practised  upon  by  nervous 
people,  valetudinarians,  and  others,  who  are  continually 
scheming  how  to  spin  out  the  thread  of  a  miserable,  sickly 
existence,  after  all  their  capacities  of  pleasure  and  enjoy 
ment  have  passed  away.  These  profound  philosophers  take 
special  pains  to  show  that  there  is  nothing  but  disease 
lurking  in  all  the  delicacies  of  ocean,  earth,  and  air,  which 
Heaven  has  blessed  us  with.  All  the  piquant  dishes  which 
lie  so  temptingly  on  the  well-spread  table,  to  tickle  the 
palate  of  the  epicure,  are,  according  to  their  view,  impreg 
nated  with  a  subtle  poison.  One  produces  flatulency, 
another  acidity;  beef  is  stimulating,  ham  is  bilious,  pork 
is  scrofulous,  fish  is  indigestible,  pastry  is  dyspeptic,  tea 
is  nervous;  and  so  on,  from  the  simplest  article  of  diet 
to  the  most  complicated  effort  of  gastronomic  skill. 

It  is  a  little  amusing  that,  while  these  ascetic  philoso- 


168  THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

phers  declaim  so  vehemently  against  the  good  things  of  this 
life,  and  predict  an  early  grave  for  every  man  who  makes  a 
hearty,  careless,  miscellaneous  meal,  they  are  generally 
perfect  amateurs  in  physic,  and  swallow  all  sorts  of  quack 
medicines  and  similar  abominations  with  infinite  relish. 
It  is  true  that  the  theories  of  the  bran-bread  philosophers 
have  received  some  countenance  from  a  few  distinguished 
writers,  particularly  Dr.  Franklin  and  the  poet  Shelley, 
who  seem  to  have  thought  that,  by  living  wholly  upon 
vegetable  food,  we  may  preserve  our  physical  and  intel 
lectual  faculties  in  a  state  of  much  higher  perfection.  But 
it  is  evident,  in  spite  of  such  speculations,  that  man  is  a 
carnivorous  animal,  and  must,  once  a  day  at  least,  be  fed 
with  flesh,  fowl,  or  fish;  he  cannot  make  a  satisfactory 
repast  off  the  roots  and  fruits  of  the  earth;  for,  though 

" His  anatomical  construction 

Bears  vegetables  in  a  grumbling  sort  of  way, 
Yet  certainly  he  thinks,  beyond  a  question, 
Beef,  veal,  and  mutton  easier  of  digestion." 

Franklin,  indeed,  was  not  a  very  zealous  convert  to  the 
Grahamite  doctrines.  He  hesitated  for  some  time  what 
course  to  pursue,  till,  at  last,  recollecting  that,  when  a  cod 
had  been  opened,  some  small  fish  had  been  found  in  its 
stomach,  he  said  to  himself:  "  If  you  eat  one  another,  I  see 
no  reason  why  we  may  not  eat  you." 

There  was  much  good  sense  in  the  remark  of  a  sainted 
Archbishop  of  York,  who  was  very  fond  of  roast  goose,  that 
so  good  a  thing  was  not  designed  specially  for  sinners. 
Not  less  wise  was  the  reply  of  Saint  Thomas  a  Becket  to  a 
monk,  who,  seeing  him  eating  a  pheasant's  wing  with  much 
relish,  affected  to  be  scandalized,  saying  that  he  thought 
Thomas  a  more  mortified  man.  "  Thou  art  but  a  ninny," 


THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING.  169 

said  the  Archbishop;  "  knowest  thou  not  that  a  man  may 
be  a  glutton  upon  horse-beans;  while  another  may  enjoy  with 
refinement  even  the  wing  of  a  pheasant,  and  have  Nature's 
aid  to  enjoy  what  Heaven's  bounty  gave?" 

In  advocating  a  due  regard  for  the  pleasures  of  the 
table,  we  commend  no  wanton  profusion.  There  is  a 
medium  between  the  abstemiousness  of  the  anchorite  or  the 
indifference  of  a  Newton,  who  sometimes  inquires  whether 
he  has  dined,  and  the  senseless  profusion  of  a  Caesar  who 
devoured  at  a  meal  the  revenue  of  several  provinces,  or  of 
those  other  Romans  who  had  single  dishes  composed  of  five 
hundred  nightingales'  tongues,  or  the  brains  of  as  many 
peacocks.  The  dinners  of  a  people, —  their  coarseness  or 
refinement,  their  profusion  or  scantiness, —  are  an  unerring 
index  of  the  national  life.  There  is,  indeed,  as  another  has 
said,  a  whole  geological  cycle  of  progressive  civilization 
between  the  clammy  dough  out  of  which  a  statuette  might 
be  moulded,  and  the  brittle  films  that  melt  upon  the  tongue 
like  flakes  of  lukewarm  snow.  In  the  early  years  of  the 
French  Eevolution  it  was  said  to  be  impossible  to  under 
stand  that  movement  unless  one  dined  at  Barrere's.  It  is 
France  that  leads  the  rest  of  the  world  in  civilization;  and 
it  is  in  France  that  the  art  of  gastronomy  has  been  carried 
to  the  last  limit  of  perfection.  In  what  other  country  did 
ever  a  maitre  d'hotel  stab  himself  to  the  heart  because  he 
could  not  survive  the  dishonor  of  his  employer's  table? 
Yet  thus  did  Vatel,  the  cook  of  the  great  Conde,  because  on 
a  great  occasion  the  sea-fish  failed  to  arrive  some  hours 
before  it  was  to  be  served;  thus  showing,  as  Savarin  has 
said,  that  the  fanaticism  of  honor  can  exist  in  the  kitchen 
as  well  as  in  the  camp,  and  that  the  spit  and  the  saucepan 
have  also  their  Deciuses  and  their  Catos. 
8 


170  THE   MORALITY   OF   GOOD   LIVING. 

While  giving  due  honor  to  the  French,  we  must  not 
forget  that  they  were  indebted  to  the  Italians  for  the 
germinal  ideas,  the  fundamental  principles,  of  the  great 
science  of  which  they  are  the  acknowledged  masters.  It 
was  in  Italy  that  the  revival  of  cookery,  as  well  as  the 
revival  of  learning,  first  began;  and  from  that  country 
the  science  of  gastronomy  was  introduced  into  the  land 
of  Savarin  and  Soyer,  by  the  artists  that  accompanied 
Catherine  de  Medicis.  When  Montaigne  visited  the  land 
of  Horace  and  Virgil,  he  was  deeply  impressed  by  the 
formal  and  weighty  manner  in  which  the  cook  in  the 
service  of  Cardinal  Caraffa  spoke  of  the  secrets  of  his  art. 
"  He  discoursed  to  me,"  says  the  old  Gascon,  "  of  the 
science  de  gueule  with  a  gravity  and  magisterial  air,  as 
if  he  was  speaking  of  some  weighty  point  of  theology." 

To  conclude,  the  cook  may  not  rank  very  high  in  the 
scale  of  humanity;  but  on  the  other  hand  it  requires 
no  great  stretch  of  imagination  to  foresee  that,  should 
ever  the  bran-bread  system  come  in  fashion,  "  living 
skeletons"  would  cease  to  be  a  wonder;  Calvin  Edsons 
would  meet  us  at  every  corner;  a  man  of  eighty  or  ninety 
pounds  would  be  a  monster  of  corpulency;  and,  ere  many 
centuries  could  elapse,  the  human  species  would  gradually 
dwindle  into  nothingness,  and  vanish  from  the  earth. 


THE  ILLUSIONS  OF  HISTORY. 


TT  is  said  that  when  in  1751  a  bill  was  introduced  into 
-*-  the  British  Parliament  for  the  reform  of  the  calendar 
by  passing  at  once  from  the  18th  of  February  to  the  1st  of 
March,  it  met  with  fierce  opposition.  Lord  Macclesfield, 
the  President  of  the  Royal  Society,  warmly  advocated  the 
bill;  and  when  three  years  afterward  his  son  was  a  candi 
date  for  Parliament  in  Oxfordshire,  one  of  the  most  vehe 
ment  cries  raised  against  him  was, — "  Give  us  back  the 
eleven  days  we  have  been  robbed  of!"  When  Mr.  Brad 
ley,  the  mathematician,  another  advocate  of  the  bill,  was 
dying  of  a  lingering  illness,  the  common  people  with  one 
voice  ascribed  his  sufferings  to  a  judgment  from  Heaven 
for  having  taken  part  in  that  "  impious  undertaking." 

Something  like  this  is  the  feeling  of  many  persons  in 
regard  to  the  havoc  made  with  their  idols  by  modern  his 
torical  criticism.  One  of  the  most  painful  moments  in  the 
experience  of  a  student  is  when,  after  having  spent  years 
in  acquiring  a  knowledge  of  the  past, —  in  building  pain 
fully,  brick  by  brick,  an  edifice  of  historical  learning, —  a 
doubt  suggests  itself  whether  the  whole  structure  does  not 
rest  on  sandy  foundations.  Beginning  his  researches  with 
belief  that  "  facts  are  stubborn  things,"  or,  as  the  Scotch 
poet  has  it,  that 

"Facts  are  chiels  that  winna  gang, 
And  daurna  be  disputed." 

he  too  often  ends  with  the  melancholy  conviction  that 
"  nothing  is  so  fallacious  as  facts,  except  figures."  That 

171 


172  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

compiled  histories,  like  those  of  Hume  and  Gibbon,  written 
by  persons  not  concerned  in  the  events,  should  abound  in 
errors,  is  not  strange;  but  it  does  startle  us  to  be  told  that 
original  memoirs,  describing  what  men  profess  to  have  seen 
with  their  own  eyes,  or  to  have  gathered  from  the  lips  of 
the  actors  themselves,  are  scarcely  less  likely  to  misrepre 
sent  the  facts  than  derived  history.  If  we  may  not  implic 
itly  believe  Eobertson,  Froude,  and  Macaulay,  shall  we  not 
credit  Clarendon,  Burnett,  and  Sully?  Yet  modern  inves 
tigation  has  shown  that  in  the  latter  class  of  writers  falsi 
fications,  exaggerations,  and  distortions  of  fact,  are  nearly 
as  frequent  as  in  the  former. 

Who  is  not  familiar  with  the  despairing  exclamation  of 
Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  on  vainly  trying  to  get  at  the  rights 
of  a  squabble  which  he  had  witnessed  in  the  court-yard  of 
the  Tower,  in  which  he  was  imprisoned?  Two  gentlemen 
had  entered  the  room,  and  given  him  conflicting,  and,  as 
he  thought,  untrue  accounts  of  the  brawl.  "  Here  am  I," 
he  cried,  "  employed  in  writing  a  History  of  the  World, — 
trying  to  give  a  just  account  of  transactions  many  of  which 
occurred  three  thousand  years  ago, —  when  I  cannot  ascer 
tain  the  truth  of  what  happens  under  my  window!"  So 
the  Duke  of  Sully  tells  us  that,  after  the  battle  of  Aumaule, 
Henry  IV,  being  slightly  wounded,  conversed  familiarly 
with  some  of  his  officers  touching  the  perils  of  the  day; 
"  upon  which,1'  says  the  Duke,  "  I  observed,  as  something 
very  extraordinary,  that,  amongst  us  all  who  were  in  the 
chamber,  there  were  not  two  who  agreed  in  the  recital  of 
the  most  particular  circumstances  of  the  action." 

Doubtless  differences  like  these  result  from  the  different 
stand-points  of  the  observers,  just  as  two  or  more  observers 
behold  each  a  different  rainbow,  since  the  sun's  rays  are 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  173 

not  reflected  in  the  eyes  of  any  two  persons  exactly  in  the 
same  angle.  Yet  the  rainbows  are  mainly  the  same,  and 
so  it  may  be  with  the  differences  of  historians.  But  what 
if  the  discrepancies  are  essential,  so  as  fundamentally  to 
vary  the  whole  statement?  What  if  the  witnesses  are 
weak  in  intellect,  dull  of  perception,  dishonest,  prejudiced, 
or  deeply  interested  to  give  a  lying  account  of  the  whole 
affair?  Have  we  all  of  Caesar's  blunders  in  his  Commen 
taries, —  all  of  Napoleon's  in  his  Memoirs?  Who  shall  tell 
us  of  the  true  character  of  the  Inquisition?  Eead  Prot 
estant  historians,  and  you  see  an  engine  of  devilish  cruelty; 
read  De  Maistre,  and  in  an  instant  all  history  is  upturned, 
and  all  your  convictions  subverted.  You  find  it  to  be  a 
mild  and  beneficent  institution,  founded  upon  the  same 
rock  of  eternal  truth  and  justice  as  martyrdom,  love  and 
heroic  sacrifice.  Who,  again,  shall  tell  us  what  was  the 
real  character  of  John  Graham,  of  Claverhouse?  How  shall 
we  decide  between  the  two  views  which  history  presents  to 
us, —  on  this  panel,  the  butcher  and  the  assassin;  on  that, 
the  heroic  leader,  with  a  rare  genius  for  war, —  the  politic 
and  tolerant  statesman,  with  a  rare  capacity  for  civil  organ 
ization? 

It  may  be  thought  that  a  historian  living  many  ages 
after  the  events  he  portrays  is  guarded  against  error  by 
the  fact  that  he  can  judge  calmly  and  philosophically  of 
men  and  their  acts ;  that  he  can  sift  the  statements  of  con 
temporary  chroniclers,  balancing  one  misstatement  against 
another,  and  thus  ascertain  the  precise  amount  of  truth. 
But  by  what  rule  is  he  to  decide  among  a  variety  of  con 
flicting  statements?  By  what  hair-balance  is  he  to  ascer 
tain  the  exact  amount  of  weight  to  be  given  to  each? 
Knowing  that,  as  Boileau  says,  "  Le  vrai  n'est  pas  toujours 


174  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

le  vraisembldble"  that  Truth  often  lacks  verisimilitude, — 
shall  he  declare  that  to  be  true  which  looks  the  most  prob 
able?  Again:  is  it  quite  certain  that  distance  from  the 
events  guards  the  historian  against  prejudice?  Is  there 
not  too  much  ground  for  the  sarcasm  of  Rev.  F.  W.  Rob 
ertson,  that  history,  in  ninety-nine  cases  out  of  a  hundred, 
is  merely  Mr.  Hume's  or  Mr.  Gibbon's  theory,  substantiated 
by  a  dry  romance,  until  Mr.  Somebody  else  comes  and 
writes  the  romance  in  his  way,  the  facts  being  pliable  and 
equally  available  for  both? 

What  are  Mitford's  and  Thirlwall's  Histories  of  Greece 
but  elaborate  and  disguised  party  pamphlets,  demon 
strating,  the  one  aristocratical  principles  from  Grecian 
history,  the  other  democratical  principles  from  precisely 
the  same  facts?  Or  what  is  Alison's  History  but  Mr. 
Wordy's  account  of  the  French  Revolution,  in  twenty  vol 
umes,  written  to  show  that  Providence  was  always  on  the 
side  of  the  Tories?  What  Abbott's  Life  of  Napoleon,  but  a 
demonstration  from  the  very  same  facts  that  the  hero  of 
Austerlitz  was  a  great  philanthropist,  who  immolated  self 
on  the  altar  of  humanity?  What  is  Macaulay's  so-called 
History  but  an  ingenious  and  masterly  piece  of  special 
pleading,  designed  to  show  that  James  II  was  a  miscreant 
unworthy  to  live,  while  the  asthmatic  skeleton,  his  succes 
sor,  an  obstinate,  hard-headed,  uninteresting  Dutchman, 
with  a  bull-dog  tenacity  of  purpose,  had,  like  Berkeley, 
"every  virtue  under  heaven?"  Has  not  Mr.  Froude 
shown  that  the  facts  of  history  are  ductile,  and  can  be 
manipulated  so  as  to  establish  any  desired  theory, —  even 
theories  the  most  opposite?  What,  indeed,  is  the  spirit  of 
past  ages,  as  preserved  in  most  histories,  "  but  the  spirit," 
as  Faust  said  to  the  student,  "  of  this  or  that  good  gentle- 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  HISTORY.  175 

man  in  whose  mind  those  ages  are  reflected?"  All  the 
events  of  the  past  come  to  us  through  the  minds  of  those 
who  recorded  them;  and  they,  it  is  plain,  are  neither  ma 
chines  nor  angels,  but  fallible  beings,  with  human  passions 
and  prejudices.  Iron  is  iron  in  all  its  forms,  but  the  sul 
phate  of  iron  will  always  differ  from  the  carbonate  of  iron. 
Smith  and  Brown  may  be  equally  anxious  to  give  us  the 
facts  of  the  past,  without  change  or  coloring;  but  the 
Smithate  of  history  will,  nevertheless,  always  differ  from 
the  Brownate  of  history.  With  the  self-same  facts,  by 
skillful  selection  and  suppression,  "you  may  have  your 
Hegel's  philosophy  of  history,  or  you  may  have  your 
Schlegel's  philosophy  of  history;  you  may  prove  that  the 
world  is  governed  in  detail  by  a  special  Providence,  or  you 
may  prove  that  there  is  no  sign  of  any  moral  agent  in  the 
universe,  except  man;  you  may  prove  that  our  fathers 
were  wiser  than  we,  or  you  may  prove  that  they  were 
fools;  you  may  maintain  that  the  evolution  of  humanity 
has  been  a  ceaseless  progress  toward  perfection,  or  you 
may  maintain  that  there  has  been  no  progress,  that  the 
race  has  barely  marked  time;  or,  again,  that  men  were 
purest  in  primeval  simplicity,  when 

"'Wild  through  the  woods  the  noble  savage  ran.'" 

In  days  of  old  there  were  historians  who  avowedly 
wrote  as  they  were  bribed.  It  was  said  of  Paulus  Jovius 
that  he  kept  a  bank  of  lies.  To  those  who  paid  him 
liberally  he  assigned  a  noble  pedigree  and  illustrious 
deeds;  those  who  gave  nothing  he  vilified  and  blackened. 
He  claimed  that  it  was  the  historian's  privilege  to  aggra 
vate  or  extenuate  faults,  to  magnify  or  depreciate  virtues, 
—  to  dress  the  generous  paymaster  in  gorgeous  robes, 
and  the  miserly  magnate  in  mean  apparel.  Many  later 


176  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

historians,  who  would  have  scorned  Jovius's  fees,  have 
not  hesitated  to  copy  his  practices, —  heightening  the  por 
traits  of  some,  and  smearing  the  faces  of  others,  as  the 
Duchess  of  Marlborough,  in  a  fit  of  rage,  did  the  por 
trait  of  her  daughter,  declaring  that  she  was  now  as 
black  without  as  within. 

What  a  tissue  of  falsification  are  many  of  the  so-called 
histories  of  England!  What  lies  have  they  perpetuated 
concerning  the  patriots  of  the  Commonwealth  and  the  age 
of  Charles  I  !  So  outrageously  have  they  misrepresented 
the  facts  and  the  principles  of  those  times,  that  even  De 
Quincey,  a  churchman  and  a  Tory,  expresses  his  disgust, 
and  affirms  that  the  clergy  of  the  Church  of  England 
have  been  in  a  perpetual  conspiracy  since  the  era  of  the 
Restoration  to  misrepresent  both.  "  There  is  not  a  page 
of  the  national  history,  even  in  its  local  subdivisions, 
which  they  have  not  stained  with  the  atrabilious  hue  of 
their  wounded  remembrances.11  Of  Cromwell's  adminis 
tration,  the  most  glorious  in  English  annals,  they  have 
given,  he  affirms,  so  mendacious  a  picture,  that  Conti 
nental  writers  have  actually  believed  that  Oliver  was  a 
ferocious  savage,  who  built  his  palace  of  human  skulls, 
and  that  his  major-generals  of  counties  were  so  many 
All  Pachas,  who  impaled  or  shot  a  dozen  prisoners  every 
morning  before  breakfast,  or,  rather,  so  many  ogres  that 
ate  up  good  Christian  men,  women  and  children  alive. 

Perhaps  no  historian  ever  piqued  himself  more  on  his 
judicial  equanimity  than  David  Hume.  It  was  a  favorite 
boast  of  his,  that  his  first  account  of  the  Stuarts  was 
free  from  all  bias,  and  that  he  had  held  the  balance  be 
tween  Whig  and  Tory  with  a  delicate  and  impartial 
hand.  Yet,  that  his  prejudices  powerfully  warped  his 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  177 

mind,  so  as  to  render  him  altogether  unsafe  as  a  historian, 
few  can  doubt.  Ten  years  after  the  first  publication  of 
his  work,  irritated  by  the  outcry  against  him  "  for  pre 
suming,"  as  he  expresses  it,  "  to  shed  a  generous  tear 
for  the  fate  of  Charles  the  First  and  the  Earl  of  Stafford," 
he  avenged  the  censure  by  recasting  his  historical  ver 
dicts,  so  as  to  render  them  offensive  to  the  party  that 
had  attacked  him.  Among  his  intimate  friends  at  Edin 
burgh  was  an  old  Jesuit,  who,  like  most  of  the  order, 
was  a  scholar  and  a  man  of  taste;  and  to  his  criticism, 
as  the  parts  were  finished,  the  MS.  was  submitted.  Just 
after  the  publication  of  Elizabeth's  reign,  the  priest 
chanced  to  turn  over  the  pages,  and  was  astonished  to 
find  on  the  printed  page  sins  of  the  Scottish  queen  that 
had  never  sullied  the  written  one.  Mary's  character  was 
the  exact  reverse  of  what  he  had  found  it  in  the  manu 
script.  Seeking  the  author,  he  asked  the  meaning  of 
this.  "  Why,"  replied  Hume,  "  the  printer  said  he  would 
lose  £500  by  that  story;  indeed,  he  almost  refused  to 
print  it;  so  I  was  obliged  to  alter  it  as  you  saw." 

But  what  truth  could  be  expected  of  a  historian  who 
wrote  lying, —  on  a  sofa?  Nothing  can  surpass  the  ex 
quisite  ease  and  vivacity  of  Hume's  narration;  the  charm 
of  the  style  which  Gibbon  despaired  of  imitating,  is  fa 
miliar  to  all.  But  the  Scottish  historian  was  too  indo 
lent  to  trouble  himself  about  accuracy.  Instead  of 
applying  his  powerful  critical  faculty  to  sift  truth  out  of 
tradition,  he  repeats  legendary  and  half- mythological 
stories  with  the  same  air  of  belief  as  the  well-authenti 
cated  events  of  modern  times.  Essentially  a  classicist  of 
the  Voltaire  and  Diderot  school,  he  despised  too  heartily 
the  barbarous  monkish  chroniclers  to  think  of  going 


178  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF    HISTORY. 

through  the  drudgery  of  examining  their  writings,  and 
winnowing  the  grains  of  fact  they  contain  from  the  chaff' 
of  superstition  and  imaginative  detail.  We  need  not  be 
surprised,  therefore,  that  the  searching  investigation  to 
which  his  history  was  subjected  some  years  ago  by  George 
Brodie  brought  to  light  so  many  departures  from  truth, 
both  wilful  and  unintentional.  "  Upon  any  question  of 
fact"  says  De  Quincey,  himself,  like  Hume,  a  Tory,  "  Hume's 
authority  is  none  at  all." 

Even  had  Hume  struggled  against  his  indolence  and 
his  prejudices,  there  is  one  source  of  error  which  he 
could  not  have  avoided.  In  condensing  a  narrative  from 
the  old  chroniclers,  and  giving  the  pith  of  their  state 
ments  in  modern  phraseology,  the  historian  almost  inva 
riably  gives  us  a  new  and  different  story.  The  events, 
characters,  all  the  features  of  the  time,  undergo  a  kind 
of  translation  or  paraphrase,  which  materially  changes 
their  character  and  gives  a  false  impression  to  the  reader, 
—  an  impression  as  false  as  that  which  Dryden  has  given 
of  Chaucer  by  his  attempts  to  modernize  the  old  bard. 
Every  one  knows  how  completely  the  aroma,  the  bouquet 
of  the  old  poet, —  the  sly  grace  of  his  language, —  the 
exquisite  tone  of  naivete,  which,  like  the  lispings  of  in 
fancy,  give  such  a  charm  to  his  verse, —  have  evaporated 
in  the  process  of  transfusion  into  more  modern  language. 
Words  and  ideas  are  so  mystically  connected, —  so  con 
natural, —  that  the  modernization  of  an  old  author  is 
substantially  a  new  book.  It  is  not  the  putting  of  old 
thoughts  into  a  new  dress;  it  is  the  substitution  of  a 
new  thought,  more  or  less  changed  from  the  original 
type.  Language  is  not  the  dress  of  thought;  it  is  the 
incarnation  of  thought,  and  it  controls  both  the  physiog 
nomy  and  the  organization  of  the  idea  it  utters. 


THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  179 

Even  when  Hume  most  unjustifiably  perverts  the  truth 
of  history,  it  is  not  usually  by  positively  false  statements. 
It  is  by  suppression  and  exaggeration, —  by  gliding  lightly 
over  some  parts,  and  scrutinizing  others  with  microscopic 
eye  and  relentless  severity, —  that  he  commonly  deceives 
the  reader;  a  process  by  which  it  is  easy  to  make  a  saint 
of  Charles  I,  or  a  tyrant  of  William  III.  In  the  same 
manner  the  author  of  "  The  Decline  and  Fall  of  the  Ro 
man  Empire "  has  Gibbonized  the  vast  tract  over  which 
he  has  traversed.  Guizot  and  Milman  have  both  com 
pared  Gibbon's  work  with  the  original  authorities,  and 
both,  after  the  intensest  scrutiny,  pronounce  him  diligent 
and  honest;  but,  as  Mr.  E.  P.  Whipple  has  observed,  this 
by  no  means  proves  that  he  gives  us  the  real  truth  of 
men  and  events.  The  qualities  of  the  historian's  charac 
ter  steal  out  in  every  paragraph;  and  the  reader  who  is 
magnetized  by  his  genius  rises  from  the  perusal  of  the 
vast  work,  informed  of  nothing  as  it  was  in  itself,  but  of 
everything  as  it  appeared  to  Gibbon,  and  especially  doubt 
ing  two  things, —  that  there  is  any  chastity  in  women,  or 
any  divine  truth  in  Christianity.  "  He  writes,"  says 
Macaulay,  "  like  a  man  who  had  received  some  personal 
injury  from  Christianity,  and  wished  to  be  revenged  on 
it  and  all  its  professors."  It  is  not,  however,  by  what 
he  expressly  says,  that  he  misleads  the  reader,  but  by 
what  he  hints  and  insinuates.  Of  all  the  writers  who 
have  "  sapped  a  solemn  creed "  with  irony,  he  is  the 
most  consummate  master  of  the  art  of  sneering.  As 
Archbishop  Whately  has  well  said,  "  his  way  of  writing 
reminds  one  of  those  persons  who  never  dare  look  you 
full  in  the  face."  Never  openly  attacking  Christianity, 
advancing  no  opinions  which  he  might  find  it  difficult  to 


180  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

defend,  he  yet  contrives  to  leave  an  impression  adverse 
to  the  idea  of  its  divine  origin.  Its  rapid  spread  is  ac 
counted  for  by  secondary  causes,  and  the  evidences  upon 
which  it  rests  are  indirectly  classed  in  the  same  category 
with  the  mythologies  of  paganism.  Through  two  chap 
ters  an  insidious  poison  is  distilled,  and  yet,  so  skilfully 
is  it  mixed,  that  it  would  be  difficult  to  put  one's  finger 
on  a  single  passage  which  the  historian  could  not  defend 
as  consistent  with  the  faith  of  the  most  orthodox  believer. 
"  No  man  should  write  history,"  says  Montaigne,  "  who 
has  not  himself  served  the  State  in  some  civil  or  military 
capacity.1'  By  this  is  meant  that  only  a  man  of  action,  one 
versed  in  affairs,  can  judge  fairly  the  conduct  of  men  of 
action,  the  man  of  books  being  almost  sure  to  judge  men 
according  to  some  fanciful  theory,  which  he  has  adopted  in 
his  chimney  corner,  of  what  they  might  and  ought  to  be, 
and  not  practically,  according  to  what  they  really  are. 
Besides  this,  there  is  yet  another  source  of  error  against 
which  the  most  conscientious  historian  finds  it  difficult  to 
guard.  It  is  that  which  Guizot  calls  the  aptness  to  forget 
moral  chronology, —  to  overlook  the  fact  that  history  is 
essentially  successive.  "Take  the  life  of  any  man,"  he 
observes, — "  of  Oliver  Cromwell,  of  Cardinal  Eichelieu,  of 
Gustavus  Adolphus;  he  enters  upon  his  career;  he  pushes 
forward  in  life,  and  rises;  great  circumstances  act  upon 
him ;  he  acts  upon  great  circumstances.  He  arrives  at  the 
end  of  all  things,  and  then  it  is  we  know  him.  But  it  is 
in  his  whole  character;  it  is  as  a  complete,  finished  piece; 
such  in  a  manner  as  he  is  turned  out,  after  a  long  labor, 
from  the  workshop  of  Providence.  Now  at  his  outset  he 
was  not  what  he  thus  became;  he  was  not  completed,  not 
finished,  at  any  single  moment  of  his  life;  he  was  formed 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  181 

successively.  Men  are  formed  morally  as  they  are  phys 
ically.  They  change  every  day.  .  .  .  The  Cromwell  of  1650 
was  not  the  Cromwell  of  1640.  .  .  .  This,  nevertheless,  is 
an  error  into  which  a  great  number  of  historians  have  fallen. 
When  they  have  acquired  a  complete  idea  of  a  man,  have 
settled  his  character,  they  see  him  in  the  same  character 
throughout  his  whole  career.  With  them  it  is  the  same 
Cromwell  who  enters  Parliament  in  1628,  and  who  dies  in 
the  palace  of  Whitehall  thirty  years  afterwards."  Who  can 
doubt  that  this  mistake  is  a  fruitful  source  of  erroneous 
judgments?  How  often  are  public  men,  —  especially 
usurpers  and  despots, —  treated  as  if  they  had  contem 
plated  at  the  outset  of  their  career  the  goal  which  they 
reached  at  last!  It  has  been  well  said  that  Cromwell 
followed  little  events  before  he  ventured  to  govern  great 
ones;  and  that  Napoleon  never  sighed  for  the  sceptre 
until  he  gained  the  truncheon,  nor  dreamt  of  the  imperial 
diadem  until  he  had  first  conquered  a  crown.  It  is  only 
by  degrees  that  a  man  attains  to  the  pinnacles  of  influence 
and  power ;  and  often  none  of  those  who  gaze  at  the  height 
to  which  he  has  risen  are  more  astonished  at  his  elevation 
than  himself. 

That  Macaulay  succeeded  better  than  Hume  is  doubtless 
true;  but  in  some  respects  he  signally  failed.  That  he 
was  far  from  being  impartial,  few,  even  of  his  admirers, 
will  deny.  He  was  a  brilliant  advocate,  rather  than  a 
calm  and  discriminating  judge.  The  most  superficial 
reader  cannot  be  blind  to  his  more  palpable  prejudices, 
such  as  his  intense  dislike  of  the  Quakers, —  his  almost 
bitter  hatred  of  the  Duke  of  Marlborough,  which  led  him 
to  paint  his  character  in  the  blackest  ink, —  and  his  idolatry 
of  William  III,  which  led  him  to  palliate  all  the  king's 


182  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

faults,  even  his  faithlessness  to  his  wife.  But  the  historian 
had  graver  faults.  To  the  height  of  the  great  argument 
of  Puritanism  he  never  rose.  Cool,  moderate,  unenthusi- 
astic  in  temperament,  his  genius  exactly  fitted  him  to 
portray  the  reign  of  Queen  Anne.  The  poets  and  the 
politicians  of  that  age  he  could  thoroughly  gauge;  and 
his  picture  of  that  brilliant  group  of  versatile,  witty, 
corrupt,  and  splendid  gentlemen  would  have  been  drawn 
with  a  masterly  hand.  But  his  hand  faltered  when  he  had 
to  register  grander  passions  and  darker  conflicts.  The 
world,  as  Macaulay  viewed  it,  was  a  very  commonplace 
world.  He  did  not  brood  over  the  mysteries  of  being, 
like  Carlyle.  His  idea  of  the  universe  was  essentially  a 
Parliamentary  one;  and  men  with  him  are  mainly  Whigs 
and  Tories.  Nothing  can  surpass  his  historical  pictures 
in  pomp  and  splendor;  they  are  woven  into  a  grand  and 
imposing  panorama,  and  every  figure,  too,  is  finished,  down 
to  the  buttons  and  the  finger  nails.  But  it  is  the  accidents, 
rather  than  the  realities  of  things,  that  he  paints.  To  use 
a  scholastic  phrase,  he  sees  the  qualities,  not  the  quiddities, 
of  men.  He  never  gets  to  their  core.  The  heroes  of  the 
Commonwealth,  and  their  motives  of  action, —  the  spiritual 
pains,  the  stormy  struggles,  which  tore  England  asunder 
in  the  seventeenth  century, —  he  never  comprehended.  His 
plummet  could  not  fathom  them ;  they  lay  beyond  the  reach 
of  his  even  temperament  and  unimpassioned  intellect,  and 
set  his  measured  antitheses  at  defiance.  The  strongest, 
richest,  most  unconventional,  most  original  characters, 
become,  when  he  touches  them,  comparatively  insipid  and 
tame. 

Macaulay's  style,  vivid,  picturesque,  and  condensed,  is 
almost  perfect  of   its  kind.     His  short,  quick  periods,   it 


THE   ILLUSION'S   OF   HISTORY.  183 

has  been  well  said,  fall  upon  the  ear  like  the  rapid  firing 
of  a  well-served  battery.  But  the  very  splendor  of  his 
style  is  often  its  chief  fault.  The  temptation  to  write 
epigrammatically, —  to  employ  strong  contrasts, —  some 
times  overmasters  his  judgment.  He  is  too  vehement  and 
intense  to  be  safe.  There  are  whole  pages  in  his  history 
with  hardly  an  adjective  that  is  not  super-superlative. 
The  antithetical  style,  which  by  its  salient  contrasts  is  so 
well  adapted  to  character-painting,  does  not  lend  itself 
readily, —  at  least  when  used  in  excess, —  to  the  exact 
expression  of  facts.  It  is  not  strange,  therefore,  that  even 
the  most  friendly  critics  of  the  Whig  historian  should  have 
complained  of  his  exaggeration.  His  characterizations  are 
too  extreme.  He  is  always  deepening  the  shadow  and 
raising  the  light.  To  those  he  likes  and  to  those  he 
dislikes  he  gives  more  white  and  black  than  are  due. 
Historical  criticism  with  him  was  only  a  tribunal  before 
which  men  were  arraigned  to  be  decisively  tried  by  one  or 
two  inflexible  tests,  and  then  sent  to  join  the  sheep  on  the 
one  hand,  or  the  goats  on  the  other.  It  is  hard  to  believe 
that  the  hero  of  Blenheim,  with  all  his  avarice,  was  a 
moral  monster,  or  that  James  II  was  a  living  contradiction 
because  he  risked  his  soul  for  the  sake  of  his  mistress,  and 
risked  his  crown  for  the  sake  of  his  creed.  Even  when 
most  dazzled  by  Macaulay's  brilliant  word-painting,  we 
feel  that  we  would  gladly  exchange  the  most  Martial-like 
epigram  and  the  most  glittering  antithesis  for  a  description 
which,  tickling  the  fancy  less,  might  be  nearer  the  truth. 

Half  of  the  lies  of  history  have  their  origin  in  this 
desire  to  be  brilliant, —  to  charm  and  surprise  rather  than 
to  instruct.  Historic  truth  is  usually  too  complex, —  too 
full  of  half-lights  and  faint  shadows, —  to  admit  of  startling 


184  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

contrasts.  The  world  is  not  peopled  with  angels  and  devils, 
but  with  men.  To  say  that  Robespierre  was  a  "  logic- 
formula,'1  with  spectacles  instead  of  eyes,  and  a  cramp 
instead  of  a  soul,  as  Carlyle  has  depicted  him,  and  that,  as 
he  half  suggests,  if  this  "  sea-green  formula "  had  been 
sanguine  and  Danton  bilious,  there  would  have  been  no 
Reign  of  Terror,  may  be  a  vivid  way  of  putting  things; 
but  we  feel  that  the  writer,  in  his  effort  to  get  below  the 
husks  and  shells  to  the  very  souls  of  things,  has  falsified 
history  as  much  by  the  excess  of  imagination  as  others  by 
the  lack  of  it. 

It  has  been  justly  said  that  in  humanity  there  is  no 
such  thing  as  a  straight  line  or  an  unmixed  color.  You 
see  the  flesh  color  on  the  cheek  of  a  portrait.  The  artist 
will  tell  you  that  the  consummately-natural  result  was  not 
attained  by  one  wash  of  paint,  but  by  the  mixture  and 
reduplication  of  a  hundred  tints,  the  play  of  myriad  lights 
and  shadows,  no  one  of  which  is  natural  in  itself,  though 
the  blending  of  the  whole  is.  A  man  who  lacks  the  historic 
instinct  ignores  all  this.  He  seems  to  think  that  all  moral 
distinctions  are  confounded,  if  Lucifer  does  not  always  wear 
a  complete  suit  of  black,  and  if  there  be  a  speck  on 
Gabriel's  wing.  In  painting  his  men  and  women,  he 
assumes  that  they  have  but  a  few  leading  and  consistent 
traits,  and  that  these  are  always  written  in  big  and  glaring 
type,  like  that  employed  by  bill-stickers;  whereas,  the  fact 
is,  that  all  men  act  more  or  less  from  inexplicable  motives, 
and  resemble  in  some  degree  the  poet  Edgar  A.  Poe, —  at 
night  the  hero  of  a  drunken  debauch,  in  the  morning  a 
wizard  of  song  whose  weird  and  fitful  music  is  like  that 
of  the  sirens. 

"I  believe  that   a   philosopher,"   says  Disraeli,  "would 


THE    ILLUSIONS    OF    HISTORY.         >  185 

consent  to  lose  any  poet  to  regain  an  historian."  No 
doubt,  if  the  exchange  were  between  a  Massey  and  a 
Mommsen,  a  Tupper  and  a  Tacitus;  but  what  if  the  poet 
to  be  exchanged  is  a  Homer  or  a  Horace,  a  Shakspeare  or 
a  Milton?  "Fancy,"  it  is  added,  "may  be  supplied,  but 
truth  once  lost  in  the  annals  of  mankind  leaves  a  chasm 
never  to  be  filled."  Unfortunately  such  a  fancy  as  that 
of  Dante  or  Milton  cannot  be  made  to  order ;  it  is  the 
growth  of  centuries;  while  the  truth  of  many  "annals" 
is  purely  imaginary.  Even  fiction  itself  is  often  more 
truthful  than  history.  The  creations  of  the  great  epic 
poets  embody  truths  of  universal  application;  and  for  a 
vivid  and  life-like  picture  of  the  civil  wars  of  England, 
you  must  go,  not  to  the  stiff  and  stately  pages  of 
Clarendon,  but  to  a  romance  of  De  Foe's,  which  Lord 
Chatham,  deceived  by  its  naturalness,  once  quoted  as 
history. 

No  one  who  has  not  compared  the  elegant  and  polished 
works  of  modern  historians  with  the  homely  old  chronicles 
on  which  they  are  based,  would  dream  of  the  extent  to 
which  the  facts  have  been  tortured  or  metamorphosed. 
Not  only  are  dry,  naked  facts  amplified,  so  as  to  clothe 
the  skeleton  of  history  with  flesh  and  blood,  but  chasms 
are  filled  up,  and  new  facts  added,  to  eke  out  the  story, 
and  make  it  more  "sensational";  while  the  entire  narra 
tion  is  often  so  clipped,  and  rounded  off,  and  polished, 
that  the  original  author,  were  he  to  rise  from  the  dead, 
would  not  recognize  his  own  offspring.  These  historians 
do  as  the  wolf  did  with  Baron  Munchausen's  horse,  who 
began  at  the  horse's  tail,  and  ate  into  him,  until  the 
Baron  drove  home  the  wolf  harnessed  in  the  skin  of  the 
horsa  It  would  be  difficult  to  name  a  practice  which 


186  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

has  been  more  fatal  to  the  trustworthiness  of  history  than 
this  of  filling  up  the  chasms  in  the  historian's  informa 
tion  with  conjecture.  A  Cuvier,  from  a  bone,  may  recon 
struct  an  antediluvian  animal;  but  it  is  not  so  with  the 
writer,  who,  from  a  few  isolated  facts,  tries  to  supply  a 
missing  chapter  in  a  nation's  history.  In  one  case  there 
is  a  correlation  of  the  known  and  the  unknown  facts,  a 
law  of  typical  conformity,  which  makes  it  easy  to  supply 
those  that  are  wanting;  in  the  other  there  is  no  analogy, 
and  we  are  left  to  our  guesses. 

What  shall  we  say  of  the  latest  historian  of  England, 
Mr.  Froude?  Few  writers  have  recognized  more  fully  than 
he,  in  theory  at  least,  the  difficulty,  nay,  impossibility,  of 
being  entirely  just  in  our  estimate  of  other  ages.  He  con 
fesses  that  in  historical  inquiries  the  most  instructed 
thinkers  have  but  a  limited  advantage  over  the  most 
illiterate.  Those  who  know  the  most, —  whose  investiga 
tions  are  the  profoundest, —  approach  least  to  agreement. 
In  the  eyes  of  Hume,  he  reminds  us,  the  history  of  the 
Saxon  Princes  is  "  the  scuffling  of  kites  and  crows." 
Father  Newman,  on  the  other  hand,  would  mortify  the 
conceit  of  a  degenerate  England  by  pointing  to  the  sixty 
saints  and  the  hundred  confessors  who  were  trained  in 
her  royal  palaces  for  the  Calendar  of  the  Blessed.  How 
vast  a  chasm  yawns  between  these  two  conceptions  of  the 
same  era!  "Again,  the  history  of  England  scarcely  inter 
ests  Mr.  Macaulay  before  the  Revolution  of  1788;  and  to 
Lord  John  Russell  and  Mr.  Hallam  the  Reformation  was 
the  first  outcome  from  centuries  of  folly  and  ferocity. 
Mr.  Carlyle  has  studied  the  same  subject  with  insight  at 
least  equal  to  theirs,  and  to  him  the  greatness  of  English 
character  was  waning  with  the  dawn  of  English  literature. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  187 

The  race  of  heroes  was  already  waning;  the  era  of  action 
was  yielding  before  the  era  of  speech."  Yet,  in  spite  of 
these  vivid  examples  of  the  difficulty  of  ascertaining  the 
real  facts  of  the  past,  and  though  Mr.  Froude  declares 
that  he  has  been  struck  dumb  with  wonder  at  the  facility 
with  which  men  fill  in  gaps  in  their  knowledge  with 
guesses, —  will  pass  their  censures,  as  if  all  the  secrets  of 
the  past  lay  out  on  an  open  scroll  before  them;  and 
though  he  acknowledges  that,  wherever  he  has  been 
fortunate  enough  to  discover  authentic  explanations  of 
English  historical  difficulties,  he  has  rarely  found  any 
conjecture,  either  of  his  own  or  of  any  other  modern 
writer,  confirmed,  yet  even  he,  it  seems,  has  not  been 
able  to  avoid  the  errors  of  his  predecessors;  in  his  own 
words,  "  has  not  been  able  to  leap  from  his  shadow."  He 
has  been  accused  by  able  writers  of  making  in  his  history 
partial  and  highly  colored  representations,  of  summarizing 
state  papers  in  such  a  way  as  to  read  into  them  a  mean 
ing  which  does  not  exist  in  the  originals;  of  throwing  in 
words  and  phrases  for  which  no  equivalent  can  be  found 
in  the  originals;  of  suppressing  facts  not  suited  to  his 
theories;  of  dealing  in  innuendoes  and  exaggerations;  and 
even  of  misquoting  and  entirely  misrepresenting  his 
authorities. 

Again,  popular  opinion  and  the  so-called  "  dignity 
of  history "  too  often  compel  the  writer  to  subordinate 
faithfulness  to  impression.  Agesilaus  must  not  hobble, 
nor  the  neck  of  Augustus  be  awry.  Hannibal  must 
not  be  one-eyed,  nor  Marshal  Vendome  humpbacked; 
Suwarrow  must  be  a  giant  in  body  as  well  as  in  intellect; 
Nelson,  though  dwarfish  and  lame,  must  stride  the  deck 
with  the  body,  as  well  as  the  soul,  of  a  hero;  Washington 


188  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

must  always  spell  correctly,  call  "Old  Put"  General  Put 
nam,  and  never  swear,  and  never  pitch  an  offending 
servant  out  of  a  window;  and  all  the  facts  must  lose 
their  ugliness  or  grotesqueness,  and  have  the  smoothly 
clipped  uniformity  of  a  Dutch  yew-tree. 

Another  of  the  banes  of  history  is  the  necessity  of  find 
ing  out  causes  of  sufficient  dignity  for  its  leading  events. 
Half  of  the  great  movements  in  the  world  are  brought 
about  by  means  far  more  insignificant  than  a  Helen's 
beauty  or  an  Achilles'  wrath.  A  grain  more  of  sand, 
thought  Pascal,  in  the  brain  of  Cromwell, —  one  more 
pang  of  doubt  in  the  tossed  and  wavering  soul  of  Luther, 
—  and  the  current  of  the  world's  history  would  have  been 
changed.  Who  can  conjecture  what  that  history  would 
have  been,  had  Cleopatra's  nose  been  shorter, —  had  the 
spider  not  woven  its  web  across  the  cave  in  which  Ma 
homet  took  refuge, —  had  Luther's  friend  escaped  the 
thunderstorm, — had  the  Genoese,  after  the  peace  of 
Paris,  not  sold  the  petty  island  of  Corsica  to  France? 
Accidents,  too,  mere  accidents, —  the  bullet  which  struck 
Gustavus  on  the  field  of  Llitzen, —  the  chance  by  which 
the  Eussian  lancers  missed  Napoleon  in  the  churchyard 
of  Eylan, —  the  chance  which  stopped  Louis  XVI  in  his 
flight  at  Varennes, —  the  death  of  Elizabeth  of  Kussia, 
which,  in  the  hour  of  Frederic  the  Great's  despair,  when 
he  was  almost  overwhelmed  by  his  enemies,  broke  the 
powerful  combination  against  him, —  turn  the  course  of 
history  as  well  as  of  life,  changing  alike  the  destinies  of 
nations  and  of  men.  Sallust  says  that  a  periwinkle  led 
to  the  capture  of  Gibraltar.  "A  chambermaid,"  wrote 
Chesterfield  to  his  son,  "  has  often  made  a  revolution  in 
palaces,  which  was  followed  by  political  revolution  in 


THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  189 

kingdoms;  the  subtlest  diplomacy  has  sometimes  been 
interrupted  by  a  cough  or  a  sneeze."  Causes  like  these, 
which  the  sensational  writer  is  fond  of  assigning,  seem 
inadequate  and  disproportionate  to  the  grave  historian; 
and  so  he  hunts  about  for  weightier  ones.  He  cannot 
believe  that  the  expedition  of  Henry  of  Guise,  who  went 
in  a  herring-boat  and  made  himself  King  of  Naples,  was 
merely  the  frolic  of  a  hare-brained  youth;  and  he  deems 
it  necessary  to  show  a  long  train  of  important  circum 
stances  leading  to  the  expedition. 

Who,  again,  is  not  familiar  with  the  rehabilitations  of 
historical  villains,  which  have  become  so  fashionable  with 
recent  historians?  Special  monarchs  or  statesmen  having 
been  selected,  whose  pilloried  bodies  have  been  for  cen 
turies  the  favorite  target  for  filth  of  every  description, 
they  have  been  subjected  to  a  scrubbing  process,  by  which 
all  their  vilest  sins  have  been  rubbed  off  them.  Not 
only  has  Ki chard  III  been  "  reconstructed,"  so  as  to  lose 
both  his  physical  and  his  moral  hump;  not  only  has  the 
Bluebeard  of  British  history,  Henry  VIII,  been  trans 
formed  into  almost  a  model  husband,  whose  only  fault 
was  excessive  uxoriousness ;  not  only  has  "bloody  Mary" 
lost  nearly  all  her  blood,  except  that  running  in  her 
own  veins ;  not  only  has  Catiline,  whom  in  our  school-boy 
days  we  learned  so  to  execrate,  been  whitewashed  into 
•a  much-abused  patriot;  but  even  the  bloody  Borgias  have 
been  bleached ;  the  Duke  of  Alva  has  been  metamorphosed 
from  a  cruel  and  cold-blooded  bigot  into  a  "  cool,  mod 
erate,  far-seeing  statesman";  Catherine  de  Medicis  has 
been  whitened ;  and  Nero  himself,  the  synonym  of  cruelty, 
will  doubtless  be  proved  to  have  been  outrageously  slan 
dered;  and  some  Froude  or  Niebuhr  will  yet  show  that, 


190  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

when  he  fiddled  while  Rome  was  burning,  he  was  only 
playing  some  "  Dead  March  in  Saul,"  or  other  funereal 
strain,  as  a  safety-valve  to  his  agonized  feelings!  But 
pray  tell  us, —  if  the  verdicts  of  the  past  are  to  be  thus 
unsettled,  and  this  process  is  to  go  on  till  all  the  "  crook- 
backed  tyrants  "  of  history  shall  have  been  physically  and 
morally  straightened,  and  its  pages  purified  from  all  cut 
throats, —  as  if  our  historians  had  resolved  to  imitate 
Canning's  nice  judge,  who 

"Swore,  with  keen,  discriminating  sight, 
Black's  not  so  black,  nor  white  so  very  white," 

—  how  shall  we  know  when  the  real  truth,  the  "  hard 
pan "  of  past  events,  has  been  reached,  and  that  History, 
now  so  changeful,  has  made  her  final  and  irreversible 
statement,  which  shall  render  her  worthy  of  her  proud 
boast  that  she  is  "philosophy  teaching  by  examples"? 

Perhaps  in  the  next  generation  the  fashion  will  have 
changed  to  the  opposite  point  of  the  compass.  We  may 
start  with  a  hero,  and  conclude  with  a  Nero;  we 
may  begin  with  a  saint,  and  end  with  a  scamp.  Indeed, 
the  disenchanting  process  has  already  begun.  Have  not 
the  German  moles,  who  have  been  burrowing  in  the 
Eternal  City  among  its  old  manuscripts  and  tombstones, 
shown  by  a  dull  realistic  philosophy  that  all  its  early 
history  is  a  myth?  Have  they  not  squeezed  the  breath 
out  of  Romulus  and  Remus,  and  shown  that  the  wolf- 
suckling  story,  which  so  charmed  our  boyhood,  is  a  fable? 
Has  not  the  famous  conspiracy  of  the  Sicilian  vespers, 
which  for  ages  has  been  the  theme  of  song  and  story, — 
which  has  inflamed  the  imagination  of  all  civilized  na 
tions  through  the  dreams  and  embellishments  of  the  nov 
elist  and  the  dramatist, —  been  lately  shown  to  be  no 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  191 

conspiracy  at  all?  Has  not  Mr.  Aaron  Goodrich,  of  Min 
nesota,  just  sought  to  sap  our  faith  in  Columbus  by 
showing  that  he  was  a  pirate,  whose  true  name  was 
Griego —  that  he  got  all  his  ideas  of  the  New  World 
from  the  Northmen  and  some  shipwrecked  Venetian  sailors, 
who  had  discovered  the  American  coast, —  that  he  meanly 
claimed  of  Queen  Isabella  the  reward  of  discovery,  though 
one  of  his  sailors  in  another  vessel  had  first  descried 
the  land,  and  he  had  again  and  again  been  ready  to  give 
up  the  expedition  in  despair?  Has  not  Mr.  John  Pym 
Yeatman  just  demonstrated, —  to  his  own  satisfaction,  at 
least, —  that  the  Normans  never  conquered  England,  but 
only  came  down  from  the  mountains  and  from  Brittany, 
and  retook  what  was  their  own  before?  Have  not  Innes 
and  Pinkerton  cut  out  eight  centuries  from  the  history 
of  Scotland,  and,  crueller  still,  knocked  in  the  head 
fifty  of  her  kings?  Are  we  not  told  that  Dion  Cassius 
painted  every  man  whom  he  disliked  as  black  as  Erebus, 
and  that  Suidas  was  accustomed  "to  invent  a  horrid 
death"  for  those  whose  doctrines  he  hated? 

Have  not  the  historical  critics  of  Germany  shown  that 
the  notion  which  so  kindled  our  youthful  enthusiasm, 
that  Brutus  stabbed  Caesar  from  patriotic  motives,  is  an 
illusion, —  that  the  actual  fact  was,  that,  it  being  the 
custom  in  old  Rome  for  the  nobles  to  lend  money  to  the 
plebeians  at  fearfully  usurious  rates,  Caesar  forbade  this 
by  a  law,  and  was  immediately  afterwards  butchered  by 
the  "  noble  "  Brutus  and  his  fellow  conspirators ;  and  that 
consequently  all  Akenside's  fine  poetry  about  Brutus's 
rising  "  refulgent  from  the  stroke,"  is  mere  poetry,  and 
nothing  more  ?  Have  not  Monsieur  Dasent  and  Mr.  Baring- 
Gould  annihilated  William  Tell  and  his  apple,  by  show- 


192  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

ing  that  no  mention  of  them  was  made  in  Switzerland 
till  about  two  centuries  after  Tell's  supposed  time,  and 
that  the  story  is  common  to  the  whole  Aryan  race,  as 
well  as  to  the  Turks  and  Mongols,  who  never  heard  of 
Tell,  or  saw  a  book  in  their  lives?  Has  not  England's 
patron  saint  been  proved  to  be  a  low  impostor,  who  got 
rich  by  fraud,  theft,  and  the  arts  of  a  common  informer, 
—  turned  religious  adventurer,  bribed  his  way  to  a  bish 
opric,  and,  at  last,  upon  being  imprisoned  for  his  crimes, 
was  dragged  out  of  jail,  and  lynched  by  an  angry  mob? 
Are  we  not  all  too  familiar  with  the  story  of  Amerigo 
Vespucchi,  the  pickle-dealer  at  Seville,  who,  though  but 
a  boatswain's  mate  in  an  expedition  that  never  sailed, 
contrived  to  supplant  Columbus,  and  to  baptize  half  the 
earth  with  his  own  dishonest  name? 

Has  any  other  department  of  history  been  so  deluged 
with  lies  as  that  of  saintly  biography?  Not  to  dwell 
upon  the  counterfeits  and  fabrications  in  mediaeval  and 
later  literature,  which  the  monks  spent  their  leisure 
in  making, —  have  we  no  brummagem  saints  in  modern 
times?  What  American  that  has  visited  London  has  not 
learned  to  honor  the  name  of  Thomas  Guy,  who  founded 
Guy's  hospital,  who  gave  away  fabulous  sums  for  benev 
olent  purposes,  and  whose  name  stares  at  us  in  stone 
in  sundry  statues?  Yet  who  and  what  was  this  Guy, 
when  stripped  of  all  his  guises?  Alas!  for  those  who 
believe  that  the  great  secret  of  happiness  is  to  preserve 
our  illusions,  this  world-renowned  philanthropist,  whom 
the  poor,  crippled  sailor  so  idolizes,  was,  if  we  may  be 
lieve  certain  English  writers,  a  clever  stock-jobber,  a 
miser,  and  a  man  who  absolutely  fattened  on  the  wrongs 
of  the  poor  cheated  Jack  Tars!  At  one  time  the  English 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  193 

* 

sailors  were  paid,  not  in  gold,  Dut  in  paper,  as  inconvert 
ible  as  our  greenbacks.  With  these  they  were  often 
forced  to  part  at  any  discount  which  the  money-changers 
chose  to  exact.  The  good  Guy  bought  these  tickets,  and 
out  of  the  profits  became  a  millionaire. 

Shall  we  add  to  all  these  instances  of  men  whom  history 
or  biography  has  canonized,  that  of  Sallust,  denouncing  in 
his  elegant  pages,  with  burning  anger,  the  corruption  of 
Rome  and  the  extortion  in  its  provinces,  yet  establishing 
his  famous  museum-gardens  "  with  the  gold  and  the  tears 
of  Numidia;"  Pope  Gregory  VII,  the  haughtiest  of  pon 
tiffs,  entitling  himself  "  the  servant  of  the  servants  of  God," 
at  the  very  time  when  he  expected  that  kings  and  emperors 
should  kiss  his  toe  and  hold  his  stirrup;  Francis  I,  the 
pink  of  chivalry,  threatening  to  stab  himself  rather  than 
sign  a  dishonorable  treaty,  and,  on  signing  a  treaty,  de 
claring  secretly  to  his  counsellors  his  intention,  on  a  mis 
erable  pretext,  of  breaking  it;  Jean  .Jacques  Rousseau, 
invoking  parental  care  for  infancy,  and  sending  his  own 
children  to  a  foundling  hospital;  Lord  Bacon,  holding 
with  one  hand  the  scales  of  justice,  and  with  the  other 
taking  bribes;  the  great  Duke  of  Marlborough,  now  acting 
history  in  minutes,  and  now  dirtying  his  hands  by  pecula 
tion  in  army  contracts, —  the  politest  of  men  and  the  mean 
est;  Lord  Peterborough,  the  hero  of  Barcelona  and  the 
amateur  cook,  walking  from  market  in  his  blue  ribbon, 
with  a  fowl  under  one  arm  and  a  cabbage  under  the  other; 
Algernon  Sydney,  one  moment  mouthing  patriotism,  and 
at  another  accepting  bribes  from  France;  the  sentimental 
Sterne,  weeping  over  a  dead  ass,  and  neglecting  a  living 
mother;  Sheridan,  firing  off  in  the  House  of  Commons 
impromptu  jokes  kept  in  pickle  for  months;  the  poet 
9 


194  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

Young,  spending  his  best  days  in  toadying  and  place- 
hunting,  and  in  old  age  satirizing  the  pursuits  in  which 
he  had  failed, —  draining  the  cup  of  pleasure  to  the  dregs, 
and  then  turning  State's-evidence  against  the  world  and 
its  follies? 

Shall  we  speak  of  the  poet  Thomson,  singing  the  praises 
of  early  rising,  and  lying  abed  till  noon;  Woodworth,  sing 
ing  in  his  "  Old  Oaken  Bucket  "  the  praises  of  cold  water, 
under  the  inspiration  of  brandy;  Dr.  Johnson,  in  his  dic 
tionary,  denning  pension  as  "  pay  given  to  a  state  hireling 
for  treason  to  his  country,"  and  afterwards  accepting  from 
George  III.  a  pension  for  himself;  William  Cobbett,  de 
nouncing  the  House  of  Commons  as  "a  Den  of  Thieves," 
and  afterwards  putting  himself  forward  as  a  candidate  for 
admission  into  this  thieving  fraternity,  and  proudly  taking 
his  place  as  one  of  its  members;  Byron,  dining  at  Eogers's 
on  a  potato  and  a  little  vinegar,  and  secretly  stuffing  like 
an  anaconda, —  sending  £4,000  to  Greece,  and  writing  pri 
vately  to  a  friend  that  "  he  did  not  see  how  he  could  well 
have  got  off  for  less"  —  or  sending  a  copy  of  his  famous 
"  Fare-thee-well "  verses  to  Lady  Byron,  with  a  butcher's 
bill  inclosed,  with  a  slip  like  this,  "  I  don't  think  we  could 
have  had  so  much  meat  as  this;"  George  I,  gaining  by  act 
of  Parliament  a  crown  to  which  he  had  no  hereditary  title, 
yet  in  his  very  first  speech  to  that  body  talking  of  "  ascend 
ing  the  throne  of  his  ancestors"?  But  England  (as  some 
of  our  examples  have  shown)  has  no  monopoly  of  what  one 
of  her  writers  has  called  "  these  humiliating  humbugs  of 
history;"  we  have  but  to  cross  the  channel  to  find  among 
her  glory-loving  neighbors  others  worthy  to  rank  with  a 
note-shaving  Brutus,  patriotic  from  private  spite,  or  a 
Thomas  Guy,  ostentatiously  giving  to  the  seamen  with  one 
hand  what  he  had  squeezed  out  of  them  with  the  other. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  195 

"  History,"  wrote  Voltaire  to  a  friend,  "  is,  after  all, 
nothing  but  a  parcel  of  tricks  we  play  with  the  dead."  .  .  . 
"  As  for  the  portraits  of  men,  they  are  nearly  all  the  cre 
ations  of  fancy;  'tis  a  monstrous  piece  of  charlatanry  to 
pretend  to  paint  a  personage  with  whom  you  have  never 
lived."  Did  the  French  historians  think  of  this  when  they 
told  the  story  of  the  Vengeur?  Kiddled  in  the  sea-fight  of 
June  1,  1794,  by  three  English  ships,  the  Vengeur,  they 
tell  us,  began  to  fill.  Her  crew  fought  her  lower  tier  of 
guns  till  the  rising  water  poured  forth  through  the  ports; 
then,  running  to  the  next  tier,  they  fired  its  guns  till  again 
the  water  drove  them  off.  Then  they  took  to  the  deck 
guns;  and,  at  last,  grouping,  with  arms  stretched  to 
heaven,  and  shouting  Vive  la  Republique!  their  colors  still 
flying,  and  preferant  la  mort  a  la  captivite,  they  went 
down,  the  waters  rolled  over  them,  and  all  was  over! 

All  this  is  very  magnifique,  and  many  a  Frenchman's 
heart  swelled  as  he  thought  that  these  men  were  his  coun 
trymen,  till  unfortunately,  a  letter  of  the  French  captain, 
written  on  the  ship  to  which  he  had  surrendered,  was  dis 
covered,  showing  that  the  Vengeur  had  struck  her  colors, 
that  her  crew  shrieked  for  help,  that  her  captain  and  a 
good  part  of  her  men  were  taken  from  her,  that  she  sank 
as  a  British  prize,  and  that  a  British  prize-crew  went  down 
with  her.  Notwithstanding  these  facts,  Thackeray  saw  in 
the  Louvre,  in  1841,  a  great  painting  representing  the 
Vengeur  going  down  with  colors  flying,  and  fired  upon  by 
the  British  sailors  in  red  coats ;  and  now,  to  save  the  na 
tional  honor,  which  is  so  much  dearer  than  truth,  the 
French  captain's  official  letter  is  pronounced  a  forgery!* 

*  Admiral  Griffiths,  one  of  the  survivors  of  the  engagement,  who  was 
living  in  1838,  declares  the  French  story  to  be  "a  ridiculous  piece  of  non 
sense."  "Never,"  he  says,  "were  men  in  distress  more  ready  to  save  them.' 
selves."  There  was  "not  one  shout  beyond  that  of  horror  and  despair." 


196  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

Perhaps  this  method  of  getting  rid  of  the  facts  was  sug 
gested  to  the  French  by  the  irony  of  Dean  Swift:  "I  have 
always,"  says  the  Dean,  "  borne  that  laudable  partiality  to 
my  own  country  which  Dionysius  Halicarnassus  with  so 
much  justice  recommends  to  an  historian.  I  would  hide 
the  frailties  and  deformities  of  my  political  mother,  and 
place  her  virtues  and  beauties  in  the  most  advantageous 

light.- 

Passing  from  the  sea  to  the  land,  who  has  not  read  the 
glorious  tale  of  the  chivalry  of  Fontenoy? —  how  two 
regiments,  French  and  English,  approached  on  the  hill, 
and  the  officers  rode  out  from  each  front,  bowing  and 
doffing  hats,  while  the  gallant  Hay  cried,  "  Gentlemen  of 
the  French  Guards,  will  you  please  to  fire  first?"  —  to 
which  the  Count  d'Auteroche  responds:  "We  never  fire 
first.1'  Now  what  were  the  facts?  Few  persons  have 
read  them,  as  stated  by  Caiiyle  in  his  Life  of  Fred 
eric  the  Great,  that  the  bowing  was  mockery,  the  polite 
speeches  huzzahs,  the  chivalry  mere  "  chaffing,"  and  that 
the  French  did  fire  first,  and  that,  too,  without  standing  on 
the  order  of  firing,  but  immediately  on  catching  sight  of 
the  English,  and  without  even  waiting  to  say,  "By  your 
leave." 

Leaving  France,  and  coming  nearer  home,  need  we 
cite  Commissioner  Quids'  defence  of  Wirz,  the  pious  jailor 
of  Andersonville ;  how  he  proved  him  to  be  a  hero  of  the 
noblest  type,  whose  only  foible  was  an  excess  of  tenderness, 
and  gave  as  a  reason  for  this  revelation  "a  desire  to 
vindicate  the  truth  of  history"?  Are  we  not  all  familiar 
with  the  thrilling  story  of  Farragut,  who,  at  the  battle 
of  Mobile  Bay,  lashed  himself  to  the  mast-head  of  his 
battle-scarred  flagship,  and  thence  signalled  to  his  fleet 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  HISTORY.  197 

as  he  sailed  by  Forts  Gaines  and  Morgan  vomiting  flame? 
The  simple  fact  is,  that  the  Admiral  was  not  at  the  mast 
head, —  was  not  lashed, —  did  not  go  aloft  to  encourage  his 
men  or  to  signal  from  his  position,  but  simply  stepped 
into  the  main  rigging  to  get  a  good  vie~,v  of  the  situa 
tion,  as  sings  Mr.  T.  Buchanan  Read: 

"  High  in  the  mizzen-shroud, 

(Lest  the  smoke  his  sight  o'erwhelm,) 
Our  Admiral's  voice  rang  loud,— 
'  Hard  a-starboard  your  helm  1 '" 

And  again: 

"  From  the  main-top,  bold  and  brief, 

Came  the  word  of  our  grand  old  chief,— 
'Go  on!'  'Twas  all  he  said, 
And  the  Hartford  passed  ahead. 

So  hard  is  it  to  get  the  facts  touching  what  is  going  on 
to-day,  and  almost  before  our  very  eyes !  "  It  is  prob 
able,"  says  an  able  Scottish  writer,  "  that  not  one  fact  in 
the  whole  range  of  history,  original  and  derived,  is  truly 
stated/1  * 

Had  we  space,  it  would  not  be  difficult  to  show  that 
many  of  the  most  striking  incidents  of  history, —  scenes 
and  events  which  artists  have  been  fond  of  depicting,  and 
orators  of  citing, —  are  pure  fiction.  Such  are  the  stories 
of  Xerxes  flogging  the  Hellespont, —  that  his  army  num 
bered  five  millions,  and  drank  whole  rivers  dry;  that  three 
hundred  Spartans  checked  his  career  at  Thermopylae, 
when,  in  fact,  they  numbered  over  seven  thousand;  that 
Virginia  perished  by  her  father's  hand;  that  Omar  burned 
the  Alexandrian  library;  and  that  Wellington  at  Waterloo 
took  refuge  in  a  square:  while  grave  doubts  have  assailed 
the  story  of  Cleopatra's  dying  by  the  asp's  sting,  that  of 

*  For  most  of  the  facts  and  citations  in  the7  last  three  pages,  the  author 
is  indebted  to  a  writer  in  the  N.  Y.  "  Galaxy." 


198  THE   ILLUSIONS   OP    HISTORY. 

Canute  commanding  the  waves  to  roll  back,  and  that  of 
Charles  IX  firing  on  the  Huguenots  from  a  window  of  the 
Louvre  during  the  massacre  of  St.  Bartholomew.  Who  is 
not  familiar  with  the  touching  story  of  St.  Pierre  and  his 
companions  delivering  up  the  keys  of  Calais  to  Edward  III, 
with  halters  round  their  necks,  and  having  their  lives 
spared  at  the  intercession  of  the  Queen?  Hume  discredited 
it;  it  was  shown  by  a  French  antiquary  in  1835  to  be 
unfounded;  and  now  a  later  French  writer  points  to  docu 
mentary  proof  that  St.  Pierre  was  in  collusion  with  the 
besiegers,  and  was  pensioned  by  the  English  King.  Who, 
again,  has  not  heard  the  popular  story  of  the  origin  of  the 
Order  of  the  Garter, —  that  it  was  owing  to  the  accident 
that  happened  to  the  Countess  of  Salisbury,  when  dancing 
at  the  court  of  Edward  III?  It  may  be  true;  but  the  first 
mention  made  of  it  is  by  Polydore  Virgil,  who  wrote  two 
hundred  years  later.  What  historical  tableau  has  been 
more  deeply  impressed  on  the  public  mind  than  the  part 
ing  of  Louis  XVI  from  his  family?  The  scene  has  been 
described  in  prose  and  verse,  and  portrayed  in  pictures  of 
all  sizes,  yet  never  occurred.  It  is  true  the  Queen  wished, 
with  the  children,  to  see  the  King  on  the  morning  of  his 
execution,  and  he  consented;  but  he  subsequently  requested 
that  they  might  not  be  permitted  to  return,  as  their 
presence  too  deeply  affected  him. 

Again:  what  Napoleon-worshipping  disciple  of  Headley 
or  Abbott  ever  dreams  of  doubting  that  the  hero  of  Lodi 
and  Austerlitz  really  did  scale  the  Alps  on  a  fiery,  high- 
mettled  charger,  with  "neck  clothed  with  thunder,"  as 
David,  the  French  artist,  has  painted  him?  But  let  us 
hear  the  great  Corsican  himself:  "  The  First  Consul 
mounted,  at  the  worst  part  of  the  ascent,  the  mule  of 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOliY.  199 

an  inhabitant  of  St.  Peter,  selected  by  the  prior  of  the 
convent  as  the  surest-footed  mule  of  that  country."  Such 
is  the  difference  between  reality  and  painting,  truth  and 
declamation.  Again  and  again  has  it  been  denied  by 
historical  critics  that  the  Russians  burned  Moscow  to  pre 
vent  Napoleon  from  making  it  his  winter-quarters;  and 
in  vain  do  they  assert  what  Mr.  Douglas,  at  one  time  our 
minister  to  Russia,  has  confirmed,  that  hardly  more  than 
the  suburbs,  where  the  French  were  quartered,  were  set 
on  fire,  to  cover  the  Russian  attack.  Maelzels  and  other 
showmen  still  renew  the  infandum  dolorem  of  the  confla 
gration  in  paintings  and  panoramas. 

So  long  as  biography  is  written,  or  an  essayist  loves 
to  point  his  moral  with  an  anecdote,  we  shall  hear  the 
story  of  Newton  and  his  dog  Diamond,  which  destroyed  the 
papers  which  the  philosopher  set  himself  so  patiently  to 
rewrite;  and  that  he  cut  two  holes  in  his  study  door  for 
his  cat  and  kitten  to  go  out  and  in,  a  big  hole  for  the 
cat,  and  a  small  hole  for  the  kitten, —  albeit  both  stories 
are  myths,  since  neither  purring  puss  nor  sprightly  poodle 
were  allowed  within  the  precincts  of  the  mathematician's 
thought-hallowed  rooms.  But  the  APPLE, —  the  falling  of 
the  apple?  Surely,  the  lynx-eyed  critics  of  history,  who 
have  cheated  us  out  of  so  many  pleasing  illusions,  will 
not  rob  us  of'' that?  In  one  sense,  it  is  of  little  conse 
quence  whether  the  story  be  true  or  false.  Unless 
observed  by  a  mind  already  so  prepared  to  make  the 
discovery  that  any  falling  body  would  have  started  the 
proper  train  of  ideas,  the  falling  of  ten  thousand  apples 
would  have  led  to  no  discovery  of  gravitation.  But  what 
are  the  facts?  We  have,  for  the  story,  the  authority  of 
several  of  Newton's  friends,  and  the  opinion  of  M.  Biot, 


200  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOltY. 

the  eminent  French  savant,  after  a  scrutiny  of  all  the 
facts  in  the  case;  yet  Sir  David  Brewster,  who,  in  the 
first  edition  of  his  biography,  declared  his  disbelief  of  the 
story,  sticks  still  to  his  incredulity;  and  rhetoricians  must 
still  refer,  with  less  confidence  than  eloquent  eifect,  to 
"  Newton  and  the  falling  apple." 

It  is  popularly  believed  that  Milton,  in  his  blindness, 
dictated  his  immortal  epic  to  his  daughters,  and  a  British 
painter  has  depicted  the  scene;  though  Dr.  Johnson,  in 
his  life  of  the  poet,  declares  that  he  would  not  suffer 
them  to  learn  to  write.  The  story  that  the  Duke  of 
Clarence  was  drowned,  at  his  own  request,  in  a  butt  of 
Malmsey,  is  still  repeated  in  popular  compilations  of  his 
tory;  and  the  Right  Hon.  J.  W.  Croker,  in  a  book  for 
children,  has  had  the  incident,  illustrated  by  a  wood-cut. 
The  only  foundation  for  the  story,  according  to  a  historian 
of  the  Tower  of  London,  is  the  well-known  fondness  of 
Clarence  for  Malmsey.  "  Whoever,"  says  Sir  Horace  Wai' 
pole,  "  can  believe  that  a  butt  of  wine  was  the  engine  of 
his  death,  may  believe  that  Richard  (the  Third)  helped  him 
into  it,  and  kept  him  down  till  he  was  suffocated." 

Till  recently  it  was  generally  believed  that  Britain 
exchanged  the  name  it  had  borne  for  more  than  a  thou 
sand  years,  for  the  new  one  of  Anglia,  or  England,  in 
the  reign  of  Egbert,  king  of  Wessex.  A  Witanegemot, 
or  Parliament,  the  old  chronicler  tells  us,  was  held  at 
Winchester,  A.D.  800,  and  then  and  there  the  change  was 
made.  But  now  comes  Francis  Palgrave  with  his  "  His 
tory  of  the  Anglo-Saxons,"  and  declares  that  the  first  nine 
years  of  Egbert's  reign  are  a  void  in  all  the  authentic 
chronicles,  that  the  country  "was  not  denominated  Eng 
land  till  a  much  later  period,"  and  that  "  the  Parliament 
of  England  is  a  pure  fable." 


THE   ILLUSIOHS   OF   HISTORY.  201 

Amono-  the  stories  of  travelers  which    have    been    re- 

O 

peated  again  and  again  in  histories,  geographies,  and  Sun 
day-School  books,  none  is  more  familiar  to  men  in 
Christian  lands  than  the  account  of  "  Juggernaut,"  the 
hideous  idol  under  the  wheels  of  whose  car  the  deluded 
heathen  of  India  have  been  supposed  to  throw  themselves, 
with  the  hope  of  winning  heaven  by  their  self-sacrifice. 
According  to  the  latest  and  highest  authorities*  on  the 
subject,  the  popular  belief  on  this  latter  point,  so  deeply 
rooted  in  childhood,  and  made  vivid  by  wood-cuts,  rests 
upon  an  entire  misapprehension  of  the  facts.  "  Juger- 
nath,"  or  rather  "  Jagernath,"  means  simply  "  the  Lord 
of  Life  " ;  self-immolation  is  utterly  opposed  to  the  spirit 
of  his  worship;  and  the  poor  wretches  who  have  been 
supposed  to  court  death  by  the  idol,  were  simply  invol 
untary  victims,  who,  among  the  multitudes  that  crowded 
round  the  rope  to  pull,  fell,  in  the  excitement,  under 
the  wheels  and  were  crushed. 

It  is  said  that  a  famous  Hebrew  commentator,  having 
determined  to  write  a  work  on  Ezekiel,  bargained,  before 
he  began  his  book,  for  a  supply  of  300  tons  of  oil.  Were 
any  writer  to  attempt  the  giant  task  of  disabusing  the 
world  of  all  its  historical  illusions,  he  would  need,  we 
fear,  not  only  tons  of  midnight  oil,  but  an  extra  pair  of 
brains  and  hands,  and  a  lease  of  lives  "  renewable  for 
ever."  Among  the  grand  and  impressive  incidents  of 
history,  none  are  more  interesting  than  the  mots,  or 
striking  expressions,  which  have  dropped  on  memorable 
occasions  from  the  mouths  of  great  men.  These,  being 
brief,  and  so  pungent  as  to  stick  like  burrs  in  the  mem- 

*"Orissa,"  by  Dr.  N.  W.  Hunter,  and  "Ten  Great  Religions,"  by  Rev. 
J.  G.  Clarke. 


202  THE   ILLUSIOKS   OF   HISTORY. 

ory,  one  might  suppose  to  have  been  accurately  caught 
and  reported  by  history.  Yet,  probably,  not  one  in  a 
hundred  of  these  famous  sayings  was  ever  uttered, —  at 
least,  as  reported, —  by  the  men  with  whose  names  they 
are  labelled.  The  fact  is,  the  vast  majority  of  these 
pungent  anecdotes  have  received  their  point  in  the  man 
ufactory  of  the  wit. 

So  long  as  the  star-spangled  banner  continues  to  wave, 
and  heroism  to  be  admired,  Americans  will  continue  to 
believe  that  General  Taylor  at  the  crisis  of  Buena  Vista 
called  out,  "  A  little  more  grape,  Captain  Bragg " ;  and 
equally  impossible  will  it  be  to  make  them  disbelieve 
that  General  Jackson  fought  at  New  Orleans  behind  breast 
works  of  cotton.  Yet  Captain  Bragg  asserts  that  the 
"  little  more  grape,"  like  the  schoolboy's  whistle,  produced 
itself, —  in  other  words,  is  a  poetic  fiction;  and  "Old 
Hickory"  always  denied  the  truth  of  the  cotton  bale 
story,  which  certainly  rather  detracts  from,  than  adds  to, 
his  glory.  The  only  foundation  for  it  was  the  fact  that 
a  few  bales  of  cotton  goods  were  flung  into  the  breast 
work,  forming  but  an  insignificant  part  of  the  material. 
Again:  how  often  on  the  anniversary  of  the  battle  of 
New  Orleans  are  we  reminded  of  the  famous  cry  of  the 
British  soldiers,  viz.:  "Beauty  and  Booty,"  though  it  has 
been  declared  by  every  surviving  officer  of  that  battle  to 
be  a  fiction.  Perhaps  no  hero  of  ancient  or  modern 
times  has  been  credited  with  so  many  grand  and  even 
sublime  utterances  which  he  never  uttered,  as  Lord  Nel 
son.  In  Southey's  admirable  life  of  the  hero,  it  is  related 
that,  when,  going  into  the  battle  of  the  Nile,  Captain 
Berry,  Nelson's  second  in  command,  was  told  of  the  plan 
and  its  probable  results,  he  exclaimed  with  transport, 


THE  ILLUSIONS   OF  HtSTOftY.  203 

"If  we  succeed,  what  will  the  world  say?"  "There  is 
no  if  in  the  case,"  replied  Nelson;  "that  we  shall  suc 
ceed,  is  certain.  Who  may  live  to  tell  the  story,  is  a 
very  different  question."  Mr.  Massey  quotes  the  anecdote 
in  his  history  of  the  reign  of  George  IV,  and  adds:  "We 
are  assured,  on  the  authority  of  Captain  Berry  himself, 
that  no  such  scene  took  place." 

Again:  who  has  not  admired  the  simple  majesty  of 
the  sentiment  expressed  in  the  order  of  Nelson  at  Trafal 
gar,  which  has  so  often  been  the  battle-cry  of  Britannia's 
sons  on  sea  and  land:  "England  expects  every  man  to  do 
his  duty"?  Yet  the  real  order  was,  ''''Nelson  expects 
every  man  to  do  his  duty,"  for  which  the  former  was 
ingeniously  substituted  by  the  officer  whose  business  it 
was  to  telegraph  the  order  to  the  fleet,  simply  because 
he  could  find  no  flag  by  which  to  telegraph  the  word 
Nelson.  Once  more, —  whose  soul  has  not  been  thrilled 
by  the  sublime  sentiment  of  the  reply  with  which  the 
same  hero  is  said  to  have  silenced  the  affectionate  impor 
tunities  of  his  officers,  when  they  entreated  him  to  con 
ceal  the  stars  on  his  breast  at  the  same  battle:  "In 
honor  I  gained  them,  and  in  honor  I  will  die  with  them! " 
History  has  recorded  few  nobler  sentiments,  than  which 
Tacitus  could  not  have  put  a  finer  into  the  mouth  of 
Agricola.  But  its  merit  is  purely  imaginative.  The  facts 
are,  as  Dr.  Arnold  gathered  them  from  Sir  Thomas 
Hardy,  that  Nelson  wore  on  the  day  of  battle  the  same 
coat  which  he  had  ivorn  for  weeks,  having  the  Order  of 
the  Bath  embroidered  on  it;  and  when  his  friends  ex 
pressed  some  fears  regarding  the  danger,  Nelson  answered 
that  he  was  aware  of  the  danger,  but  that  it  was  "  too 
late  then  to  shift  a  coat." 


204  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

"Up,  Guards,  and  at  them!"  men  will  always  believe 
to  have  been  the  exclamation  of  Wellington,  while  they 
thrill  at  the  story  of  Waterloo,  in  spite  of  the  Duke's 
protest  that  he  uttered  no  such  nonsense;  and  just  as 
implicitly  will  they  believe  the  tallying  statement,  that 
the  captain  of  the  Imperial  Guards  uttered  the  bravado, 
"La  garde  meurt,  et  ne  se  rende  pas!" — which  is  purely 
a  myth,  albeit  so  dramatically  introduced  by  Victor  Hugo 
in  his  picture  of  the  battle  in  Les  Miserables,  and  in 
scribed,  too,  on  the  monumem  at  Nantes.  The  last 
bombastic  phrase  was  a  pure  ir.yention  of  a  French  jour 
nalist  two  days  after  the  bactle.  On  the  authority  of 
Lamartine,  every  Frenchman  religiously  believes  that 
Wellington  in  that  terrible  fight  had  seven  horses  killed 
under  him,  though  it  is  well  known  in  England  that 
Copenhagen,  the  one  horse  that  bore  him  through  the  day, 
escaped  the  murderous  bullets,  and  died  "in  a  green  old 
age"  at  Strathfieldsaye.  If  we  may  believe  the  same 
poetic  writer,  the  French  were  not  beaten  at  Waterloo; 
they  simply  left  the  field  in  disgust.  The  splendid  irony 
of  Alexandre  Dumas's  compliment  to  the  author  of  the 
"History  of  the  Girondins"  has  rarely  been  surpassed. 
Meeting  Dumas  soon  after  the  publication  of  that  work, 
Lamartine  inquired  anxiously  of  the  great  romancer,  if 
he  had  read  it.  "  Ouij  Jest  superbe!  C'est  de  Vhistoire 
elevJe  a  la  hauteur  du  roman" 

A  less  memorable  French  mot  than  that  invented  for 
the  commander  of  the  Imperial  Guard,  is  the  cry  of 
Philip  of  Valois,  when,  flying  from  the  battle  of  Crecy, 
he  arrived  before  the  closed  gates  of  the  Castle  of  Braye, 
and  exclaimed:  "  Ouvrez,  ouvrez,  Jest  la  fortune  de  la 
France, —  Open,  open  to  the  fortunes  of  France."  Turn- 


THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  205 

ing  to  Froissart,  the  original  source  of  the  anecdote,  we 
find  —  what  ?  Instead  of  the  fine  sentiment  we  have  quoted, 
by  which  the  king  embodies  in  himself  the  stricken  for 
tunes  of  his  country,  only  the  tame  exclamation,  "  Ouvress, 
ouvrez,  c'est  Vinfortune  Roi  de  la  France, —  Open,  open; 
'tis  the  unfortunate  King  of  France."  Will  any  one  who 
knows  the  intensity  of  a  Frenchman's  love  for  dramatic 
"  effects,"  be  surprised  to  learn  that  Chateaubriand,  that 
splendide  mendax  writer,  having  misrelated  this  story  in 
his  History  of  France,  refused,  on  being  informed  of  his 
error,  to  correct  it?  Or  is  it  strange  that,  with  the  same 
noble  scorn  for  strict  accuracy,  and  exclusive  regard  for 
artistic  effect,  Voltaire,  on  being  asked  where  he  found  a 
certain  startling  "fact,"  in  one  of  his  histories,  replied: 
"It  is  a  frolic  of  my  imagination?"  For  three  centu 
ries,  historians  have  delighted  to  repeat  the  heroic  senti 
ment  expressed  by  Francis  I,  when  writing  to  his  mother 
from  the  battle-field  of  Pavia:  "All  is  lost  but  honor" 
(Tout  est  perdu  fors  Vhonneur).  But  how  runs  the  letter 
which  the  King  actually  wrote  on  the  occasion,  and  which 
has  been  preserved?  Instead  of  the  pithy,  epigrammatic 
communication,  as  terse  as  a  telegram,  which  Francis  is 
said  to  have  despatched  from  the  battle-field,  and  which 
so  electrifies  the  reader  as  the  grand  outburst  of  a  regal 
spirit  in  sudden  adversity,  it  turns  out  that  the  French 
monarch  wrote  in  prison,  by  permission,  a  long  letter,  in 
which,  after  describing  the  battle,  he  says,  prosaically: 
"  With  regard  to  the  remaining  details  of  my  misfortune, 
honor,  and  life,  which  is  safe,  (Thonneur  et  la  vie  qui  est 
saulve,)  are  all  that  are  left  to  me,"  etc.,  etc.  Hardly  less 
diluted  in  the  original  is  the  sententious  despatch  which 
Henry  IV.  is  said  to  have  written  to  one  of  his  nobles 


206  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

after  the  battle  of  Arques:  "Hang  thyself,  brave  Crillon; 
we  have  fought,  and  thou  wert  not  there!"  When  we 
have  learned,  too,  that  "  Hang  thyself! "  was  a  hackneyed 
expression  of  Henry's,  repeated  on  the  most  trivial  occa 
sions,  the  mot  sinks  into  the  veriest  commonplace. 

What  is  more  hackneyed  than  the  saying  attributed  to 
Demosthenes,  that  "action,  action,  action!"  that  is,  gesticu 
lation,  is  the  one  thing  essential  to  success  in  oratory? 
The  word  he  used  is  x>tvrl<n':,  the  true  signification  of  which 
is  agitation,  motion,  anything  of  a  stirring  character.  Not 
action,  but  emotion,  which,  if  deeply  felt,  like  murder, 
"  will  out,"  was  what  Demosthenes  held  to  be  so  vitally 
essential,  agreeing  herein  with  the  well-known  maxim  of 
Horace,  that  "  if  you  wish  me  to  weep,  you  must  first  grieve 
yourself."  Again:  how  often  has  Cicero  been  quoted  as 
having  said,  "  I  would  rather  err  with  Plato  than  hold  the 
truth  with  the  philosophers."  The  real  sentiment  of  Cicero, 
"Errare  mehercule  malo  cum  Platone  .  .  .  quam  cum  istis 
vera  sentire" — which  has  been  so  often  applauded  by  some, 
and  by  others  denounced  as  an  instance  of  excessive  and 
almost  idolatrous  reverence  for  a  giant  intellect, —  occurs 
in  the  "  Tusculan  Questions  " ;  and  it  is  only  by  the  grossest 
perversion  of  the  language  that  it  can  be  construed  into 
such  an  expression  of  a  humiliating  general  submission  to 
the  authority  of  Plato  as  it  is  supposed  to  contain.  The 
immediate  point  under  discussion  was  the  immortality  of 
the  soul,  which  was  maintained  by  Plato,  but  denied  by  the 
Epicureans ;  and  it  is  solely  with  reference  to  the  conclusion 
of  Plato  on  this  one  point,  not  to  the  weight  of  his  authority, 
that  Cicero  prefers  to  err  with  him  rather  than  to  think 
rightly  with  them.  In  other  words,  the  Roman  writer 
prefers  to  share  with  the  Greek  what  he  deems  the  benefi- 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  207 

cent  possible  error  of  eternal  life,  rather  than  entertain 
with  Plato's  opponents  what  he  (Ciceiro)  regards  as  the 
fearful  and  pernicious  truth,  if  truth  it  be,  of  final  anni 
hilation. 

A  suspicious  circumstance  connected  with  many  fine 
sentiments  is,  that  they  have  been  put  by  historians  into 
the  mouths  of  different  persons,  and  on  widely  different 
occasions, —  thus  suggesting  a  doubt  whether  they  were  not 
invented  for  rhetorical  effect.  Thus  when  Louis  XIV 
revoked  the  Edict  of  Nantes,  Christina  of  Sweden  is 
reported  to  have  said:  "He  has  cut  off  his  left  arm  with 
the  right."  The  epigram  is  as  old  as  Valentinian.  Almost 
every  reader  is  familiar  with  the  sarcasm  attributed  to 
Lord  Eldon,  concerning  his  successor  on  the  woolsack, 
Lord  Brougham,  "  If  he  only  knew  a  little  of  law,  he 
would  know  a  little  of  everything."  This  is  but  a  recoin- 
age  of  a  saying  of  Louis.  Passing  out  of  chapel  after  a 
sermon  by  the  Abbe  Maury,  he  said:  "If  the  Abbe*  had 
said  a  little  of  religion,  he  would  have  spoken  to  us  of 
everything."  Sully,  in  his  Memoirs,  tells  us  that  going  one 
day  to  see  Henry  IV.  he  met  on  the  back  stairs  leading  to 
the  King's  apartment,  a  young  lady  veiled  and  dressed  in 
green.  Being  asked  by  the  King  whether  he  had  not  been 
told  that  his  majesty  had  a  fever,  and  could  not  receive 
that  morning:  "Yes,  sire,"  replied  the  minister,  "  but  the 
fever  is  gone;  I  have  just  met  it  on  the  staircase  dressed 
in  green."  Precisely  the  same  story  is  told  of  Demetrius 
and  his  father. 

"  Were  I  to  die  at  this  moment,"  Nelson  is  said  to  have 
written  to  the  English  government  after  the  Battle  of  the 
Nile,  "  more  frigates  would  be  found  written  on  my  heart." 
Two  and  a  half  centuries  before,  Mary,  Queen  of  England, 


208  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

is  said  to  have  deplored  the  loss  of  the  last  foothold  of  the 
English  in  France  with  the  exclamation,  "  When  I  die 
Calais  will  be  found  written  on  my  heart."  Once  more: 
Mr.  Motley  tells  us  in  his  History  of  the  Dutch  Republic, 
that  Montpensier,  a  French  prince,  protested  to  Philip  II 
of  Spain  that  he  would  be  cut  in  pieces  for  that  monarch's 
service,  and  affirmed  that  "  if  his  body  were  to  be  opened 
at  that  moment,  the  name  of  Philip  would  be  found 
imprinted  on  his  heart."  Who  has  not  admired  the  noble 
reply  of  Wellington  to  a  lady  who  expressed  a  passionate 
desire  to  witness  a  great  victory, — "Madam,  there  is 
nothing  so  dreadful  as  a  great  victory, —  excepting  a  great 
defeat."  Yet  this  speech  was  made  long  before  by  D'Ar- 
genson,  and  is  reported  by  Grimm.  Among  the  countless 
pungent  witticisms  attributed  to  Voltaire,  we  are  informed 
that  having  extolled  Haller,  he  was  told  that  he  was  very 
generous  in  so  doing,  since  Haller  had  just  said  the  con 
trary  of  him ;  whereupon  Voltaire  remarked,  after  a  short 
pause,  "  Perhaps  we  are  both  of  us  mistaken."  Is  it  not 
a  curious  coincidence,  that,  centuries  before  this,  Libanius 
should  have  written  to  Aristaenetus,  "You  are  always 
speaking  ill  of  me.  I  speak  nothing  but  good  of  you. 
Do  you  not  fear  that  neither  of  us  shall  be  believed?" 

It  has  been  said  with  truth  that  in  Athenaeus,  Macro- 
bius,  and  other  old  jest-books,  we  shall  find  more  than  one 
witty  saying  which  now  adorns  the  brazen  front  of  the 
plagiary.  It  is  stated  that  when  Lord  Stormont  boasted 
to  Foote,  the  English  comedian,  of  the  great  age  of  some 
wine  which,  in  his  parsimony,  he  doled  out  in  very  small 
glasses,  Foote  observed,  "  It  is  very  little  of  its  age."  This 
identical  joke  is  reported  by  Athenaeus,  and  assigned  to  one 
Gnathsena,  whose  jokes  were  better  than  her  character. 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  2C9 

In  Irving's  "Abbotsford"  we  are  told  that  Sir  Walter 
Scott  was  going  on  with  great  glee  to  tell  a  story  of  the 
Laird  of  Macnab,  "  who,  poor  fellow,"  he  said,  "  is  dead 
and  gone."  "  Why,  Mr.  Scott,"  exclaimed  his  "gu.de  wife," 
"  Macnab's  not  dead,  is  he?"  "Faith,  my  dear,"  replied 
Scott,  with  humorous  gravity,  "  if  he  is  not  dead,  they 
have  done  him  great  injustice,  for  they've  buried  him." 
The  joke  "  passed  harmless  and  unnoticed  by  Mrs.  Scott, 
but  hit  the  poor  Dominie  just  as  he  had  raised  a  cup  of  tea 
to  his  lips,  causing  a  burst  of  laughter  which  sent  half  of 
the  contents  about  the  table."  Queer, —  is  it  not, —  that  in 
Dean  Swift's  specimens  of  genteel  conversation  in  his  own 
time,  we  should  find  the  following:  "  Colonel.  Is  it  certain 
that  Sir  John  Blunderbuss  is  dead  at  last?  Lord  Sparkish. 
Yes,  or  else  he's  sadly  wronged,  for  they  have  buried  him." 
Among  the  after-dinner  facetiae  attributed  to  Thackeray  is 
a  saying  of  his  to  Angus  B.  Reach,  a  clever  young  Scotch 
man,  who,  when  addressed  as  Mr.  Reach,  indignantly 
exclaimed,  "My  name  is  pronounced  Ree-ack,  in  two 
syllables."  Handing  his  angry  neighbor  a  peach,  Mr. 
Thackeray  said:  "Mr.  Ree-ack,  will  you  allow  me  to  help 
you  to  a  pee-ack?"  In  the  Diary  of  Thomas  Moore,  we 
read  that  Luttrell,  the  wit,  dined  at  the  same  table  with  a 
gentleman  whose  father  invented  the  small  napkins  called 
from  the  name,  doilies.  This  gentleman  having  insisted 
on  being  addressed  as  Mr.  D'Oyley,  with  a  long  rest 
between  the  "  D "  and  the  rest  of  the  name,  Luttrell, 
pointing  to  a  dumpling,  blandly  said,  "  Mr.  D' —  Oyley, 
may  I  ask  you  for  a  little  of  the  d' — umpling,  near  you?" 

Macaulay's  famous  New  Zealander  is  now  known  to  be 
the  same  person,  in  different  costume,  as  Shelley's  "  Trans 
atlantic  Commentator,"  Kirke  White's  "  Bold  Adventurer," 


210  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOKY. 

and  Horace  Walpole's  "  Traveler  from  Lima";  and  the  joke 
attributed  to  Sheridan,  on  his  son's  saying  that  he  had  gone 
down  a  mine  to  be  able  to  say  he  had  done  so, — "  Why  not 
say  you  had,  without  going  down?1'  has  been  reclaimed  by 
Mr.  Forster  for  Goldsmith.  An  English  wit  used  to  say: 
"  I  don't  like  my  jokes  until  Sheridan  has  used  them,  then 
I  can  appreciate  them."  Wit,  it  has  been  well  said,  like 
gold,  is  circulated  sometimes  with  one  head  on  it,  and  some 
times  with  another,  according  to  the  potentates  who  rule  its 
realm.  What  was  the  memorable  jest,  in  all  the  news 
papers  a  few  years  ago,  about  the  eccentricities  of  a 
certain  family,  but  a  repetition  of  Lady  Mary  Wortley 
Montagu's  witticism  that  "  the  world  was  made  up  of  men 
and  women  and  Herveys?"  So  the  germ  of  Douglas  Jer- 
rold's  joke,  that  "  it  is  better  to  be  witty  and  wise  than 
witty  and  otherwise,"  has  been  detected  in  a  book  pub 
lished  in  1639;  and  the  threadbare  illustration  of  a  dwarf 
standing  on  the  shoulders  of  a  giant,  employed  to  illustrate 
the  advantage  of  modern  over  ancient  learning,  is  used  by 
Sir  William  Temple,  is  quoted  by  old  Burton,  and  has  been 
traced  back  to  the  twelfth  century. 

Many  of  these  similarities  of  thought  and  expression, 
like  many  wonderful  discoveries  and  inventions,  are,  no 
doubt,  merely  coincidences.  As  the  human  mind  and  the 
human  heart  are  the  same  in  all  ages,  we  must  not  be  sur 
prised  to  find  that 

"—kindred  objects  kindred  thoughts  inspire, 
As  summer  clouds  flash  forth  electric  fire." 

Perhaps  of  all  the  memorable  sayings  of  great  men, 
there  is  no  other  about  which  lovers  of  rhetoric  have  so 
often  had  their  commonplace,  as  about  the  famous  "  e  pur 
si  muove" — "and  yet  the  earth  does  move," — of  the 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  211 

silenced,  but  not  persuaded  Galileo.  And  yet,  as  a  late 
French  writer  has  shown,  not  only  is  there  no  proof  that 
Galileo  ever  uttered  the  epigram,  but  it  flagrantly  con 
tradicts  his  whole  demeanor  on  the  trial.  To  regard  him 
as  a  martyr  of  science  is  simply  ridiculous.  Never  was 
a  martyr  less  disposed  for  martyrdom.  He  denied  every 
thing  with  impatient  alacrity.  He  offered  to  prove  that 
he  had  never  held  the  doctrine  of  the  earth's  mobility,  and 
declared  himself  ready  to  show,  by  fresh  arguments,  the 
error  of  that  doctrine.  In  short,  the  epigram  is  "  one  of 
those  mots  de  cir Constance,  invented  after  the  occasion, 
which  tradition  eagerly  adopts  because  it  so  admirably 
expresses  the  general  sentiment." 

Writers  on  religious  toleration  are  fond  of  quoting  the 
supposed  saying  of  Charles  V,  Emperor  of  Germany,  who 
in  his  retirement  kept  many  clocks  and  watches,  the  mech 
anism  of  which  he  was  fond  of  studying,  that  it  was  un 
reasonable  to  expect  men  to  think  alike,  when  no  two 
clocks  or  watches  could  be  made  to  keep  precisely  the  same 
time.  Not  only  does  the  story  rest  on  no  good  authority, 
but  its  mythical  character  is  evident  a  priori  from  the  fact 
that  in  his  last  hours  Charles  enjoined  on  his  son  Philip  to 
enforce  uniformity  of  opinion  by  means  of  that  terrible 
engine,  the  Inquisition.  Moreover,  he  again  and  again 
expressed  his  regret  that  he  did  not  put  Luther  to  death 
when  he  had  him  in  his  power.  Another  story  of 
Charles,  long  implicitly  believed  on  the  authority  of  the 
Scottish  historian,  Robertson,  but  now  exploded,  is  that  the 
Emperor  held  a  mock  funeral  of  himself, —  celebrated  his 
own  obsequies, —  and  in  so  doing  caught  a  cold  which  made 
a  real  funeral  necessary  two  days  afterwards. 

Among  the  stereotyped  quotations  of  our  political  wri- 


212  THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

ters  and  stump  orators,  there  is  no  one  which  drops  oftener 
from  their  lips  and  pens  than  that  which  is  so  generally 
attributed  to  Gen.  Charles  Cotesworthy  Pinckney,  namely: 
"Millions  for  defence, —  not  one  'cent  for  tribute/'  While 
Mr.  P.  was  Ambassador  to  the  French  Court,  Bonaparte 
was  preparing  for  operations  against  Great  Britain,  and 
had  pledged  the  representatives  of  other  powers  to  degrad 
ing  contributions.  What  Mr.  Pinckney  really  did  say, 
when  Napoleon  turned  to  him  and  asked,  "  And  what  will 
your  Republic  give?"  was,  "Not  a  penny, —  not  a  penny." 
The  cent  was  not  then  known  among  our  coin.  Nearly 
contemporary  with  this  was  the  witty  reply  said  to  have 
been  made  by  Thelwall  to  Erskine,  when  the  latter,  in 
reply  to  the  former's  proposal  to  defend  himself  from  the 
charge  of  treason,  wrote,  "  If  you  do,  you'll  be  hanged." 
"Then  I'll  be  hanged  if  I  do,"  was  Thelwall's  prompt 
rejoinder.  A  living  relative  of  Thelwall's  declares  that 
he  had  from  his  own  lips  the  statement  that  no  such  cor 
respondence  ever  took  place. 

Of  all  the  brilliant  epigrammatic  sayings  that  have  been 
attributed  to  the  wrong  author,  no  one  perhaps  has  been 
more  frequently  quoted  than  that  ascribed  to  that  prince 
of  epigrammatists,  Talleyrand,  on  the  murder  of  the  Duke 
D'Enghien  by  Napoleon:  "It  is  worse  than  a  crime:  it  is 
a  blunder."  The  real  author  of  the  mot  was  Fouche.  So, 
because  they  have  the  ring  of  his  unique  witticisms,  to. 
Talleyrand  have  been  attributed  the  saying,  "  It  is  the 
beginning  of  the  end;"  the  Chevalier  de  Panat's  remark 
on  the  Bourbons,  that  "  they  had  learned  nothing,  and  for 
gotten  nothing;"  the  saying  of  Chamfort  that  "  revolutions 
are  not  made  with  rose-water;"  and  Napoleon's  observa 
tion,  "A  king  by  birth  is  shaved  by  another.  He  who 


THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  213 

makes  kings  is  shaved  by  himself."  To  the  same  arch 
diplomatist  and  wit  has  been  attributed  the  famous  saying 
that  "  speech  was  given  to  man  to  conceal  his  thoughts," — 
a  mot  which  has  been  traced  back  to  Goldsmith,  to  Voltaire, 
to  the  poet  Young,  to  South,  to  Job,  till  we  almost  reach 
the  Prometheus  who  stole  the  original  fire  from  Heaven. 
So  lucky  or  so  cunning  was  Talleyrand  that  he  even  got 
the  credit  of  saying  of  others  what  was  said  against  him 
self.  Thus,  the  remark,  "  Who  would  not  adore  him, —  he 
is  so  vicious?"  was  said  of  him  by  Montrond,  not  by  him 
of  Montrond ;  and  his  pithy  interrogatory  to  the  dying  man 
who  cried  out  that  he  was  suffering  the  torments  of  the 
damned, — "Deja?"  (Already?) — was  murmured  by  Louis 
Phillippe  when  Talleyrand  thus  characterized  his  own  suf 
ferings. 

Of  all  peoples  the  French  have  the  most  passionate  love 
for  epigrams,  and  when  a  great  man  or  a  great  occasion 
wants  one,  they  do  not  hesitate  to  invent  it.  Chamfort 
characterizes  the  old  regime  as  "an  absolute  monarchy 
tempered  by  epigrams."  Henry  IV  reigned  by  bon  mots, 
and  even  Bonaparte,  in  the  plenitude  of  his  power,  could 
not  dispense  with  them.  It  was  in  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV 
that  they  reached  the  zenith  of  their  splendor.  When  the 
king  made  an  appointment,  he  communicated  it  to  the 
object  of  his  condescension  in  an  elegant  saying.  "  If  I 
had  known  a  more  deserving  person,"  he  would  say,  "  I 
would  have  selected  him."  Perhaps  no  impromptu  has 
been  more  admired  than  the  well-known  saying  of  Louis 
XII.  when  urged  to  revenge  certain  insults  offered  to  him 
before  his  accession  to  the  throne:- "The  King  of  France 
does  not  revenge  the  injuries  of  the  Duke  of  Orleans." 
Of  both  the  Roman  Emperor,  Hadrian,  and  the  Duke  of 


214  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

Savoy,  predecessors  of  Louis,  is  the  same  anecdote  related; 
and,  instead  of  being  uttered  thus  concisely  by  Louis  to 
the  Duke  de  la  Tremouille,  the  saying  was  the  conclusion 
of  an  address  to  the  deputies  of  the  city  of  Orleans,  who 
were  told  that  it  would  not  be  decent  or  honorable  in  a 
King  of  France  to  revenge  the  quarrels  of  a  Duke  of  Or 
leans.  The  reply  of  Hadrian  was:  " Minime  licere  Prin- 
cipi  Romano  ut  quce  privatus  agitasset  odia,  ista  Imperator 
exequi" 

Who  has  not  admired  the  daring  address  of  Mirabeau 
to  the  minister  of  Louis  XVI,  who  had  been  sent  to  the 
National  Assembly,  to  demand  its  dissolution? — "Go  tell 
your  master  that  we  are  here  by  the  will  of  the  people, 
and  that  we  will  not  depart  except  at  the  point  of  the 
bayonet!"  The  real  language  of  Mirabeau  is  far  milder, 
and  lacks  the  most  audacious  words  ascribed  to  him. 
Almost  every  history  of  the  French  Revolution  records 
the  famous  invocation  to  Louis  on  the  scaffold:  "Fils  de 
Saint-Louis,  montez  au  del!"  Yet,  when  questioned  on  the 
address  by  Lord  Holland,  the  Abbe  Edgeworth  frankly 
owned  that  he  had  no  recollection  of  having  made  it.  It 
was  put  into  his  mouth,  on  the  evening  of  the  execution, 
by  a  journalist. 

One  of  the  most  signally  successful  hits  in  the  form 
of  an  invented  saying,  in  French  history,  is  the  speech 
put  into  the  mouth  of  the  Comte  d'Artois,  brother  of 
Louis  XVIII,  at  the  Restoration.  As  his  Royal  Highness 
rode  into  town,  he  was  received  by  a  brilliant  company, 
and,  in  reply  to  an  address  by  Talleyrand,  stammered  out 
a  few  confused  sentences,  for  which  it  was  felt  by  the 
shrewd  statesman  that  some  substitute  must  be  prepared 
for  the  Moniteur.  Dupont  offered  to  do  it.  "  No,  no," 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOEY.  215 

replied  Talleyrand,  "you  would  make  it  too  poetical. 
Beugnot  will  do  for  that."  Beugnot  sat  down  to  his 
task,  but,  finding  some  difficulty,  returned  to  Talleyrand, 
and  told  him  of  it.  "  Why,"  said  Talleyrand,  "  if  what 
he  said  does  not  suit  you,  invent  an  answer  for  him.1' 
"  But  how  can  I  make  a  speech  that  Monsieur  never  pro 
nounced?"  "There  is  no  difficulty  about  that,"  replied 
Talleyrand;  "make  it  good,  suitable  to  the  person  and 
to  the  occasion,  and  I  promise  you  that  Monsieur  will 
accept  it,  and  so  well,  that  in  two  days  he  will  believe 
he  made  it  himself;  and  he  will  have  made  it  himself; 
you  will  no  longer  have  had  anything  to  do  with  it." 
'"Capital!1  I  answered,  says  Beugnot,  "and  attempted 
my  first  version,  and  brought  it  to  be  approved.  '  That 
won't  do,1  said  Talleyrand;  'Monsieur  never  makes 
antitheses  or  rhetorical  flourishes.'  I  attempt  a  new 
version,  and  am  sent  back  a  second  time  for  making  it 
too  elaborate.  At  last  I  am  delivered  of  the  one  inserted 
in  the  Moniteur,  in  which  I  make  the  prince  say:  'No 
more  discord:  Peace  and  France;  at  last  I  revisit  my 
native  land;  nothing  is  changed,  except  it  be  that  there 
is  one  Frenchman  the  more.'  '  This  time  I  give  in ! ' 
exclaimed  Talleyrand.  '  That  is  what  Monsieur  did  say, 
and  I  answer  for  its  having  been  pronounced  by  him.' 
In  fact,  the  speech  proved  a  perfect  success;  the  news 
papers  took  it  up  as  a  lucky  hit;  it  was  repeated  as  an 
engagement  made  by  the  Prince;  and  the  expression, 
1  One  Frenchman  more!"1  became  the  necessary  pass- word 
of  the  harangues,  which  began  to  pour  in  from  all  quar 
ters.11  When  the  Prince  complained  to  the  ministers  that 
he  never  uttered  it,  he  was  told  that  there  was  an 


216  THE    ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

imperious  necessity  for  his  having  uttered  it;  and  it 
became  history. 

But  the  French  are  not  the  only  people  who  have  been 
cheated  into  admiration  of  grand  oratorical  explosions 
that  never  took  place.  Chatham's  famous  outburst  in 
reply  to  Horace  Walpole,  beginning,  "  The  atrocious  crime 
of  being  a  young  man,"  etc.,  is  the  composition  of  Dr. 
Johnson,  who  was  not  even  present  when  the  actual  reply 
was  made,  and  of  whose  fidelity  as  a  parliamentary  reporter 
we  may  judge  from  his  boast  that  he  took  care  always 
that  the  Whig  dogs  should  have  the  worst  of  it. 

The  interest  which  attaches  to  the  dying  words  of 
great  men  offers  a  powerful  temptation  to  the  inventive 
talents  of  historians  and  biographers.  Many  of  these  last 
utterances  are  too  epigrammatic  and  sensational, —  too 
well  rounded  off  and  polished, —  not  to  provoke  a  doubt 
about  their  genuineness.  Did  Augustus  Caesar,  in  dying, 
ask  if  he  had  played  his  part  well  on  life's  stage,  and, 
when  answered  in  the  affirmative,  say,  "Then  applaud"? 
Did  Vespasian  bid  his  attendants  raise  him  from  his 
couch,  adding  that  an  Emperor  ought  to  die  on  his  legs, 
— decet  Imperatorem  stantem  mori?  Did  Chaucer  alleviate 
his  dying  pains  by  "A  Balade,  made  upon  his  dethe- 
bedde,  lying  in  his  great  anguysse"?  Did  Scarron  say 
to  those  weeping  about  him,  "  My  children,  you  will 
never  weep  for  me  one  half  so  much  as  I  have  made 
you  laugh"?  Did  Chesterfield,  courteous  to  the  last,  gasp 
out  in  articulo  mortis,  "  Give  Dayrolles  a  chair "  ?  How 
often  has  it  been  stated  in  private,  and  echoed  from 
the  pulpit,  that  the  skeptic  Hume  died  in  an  agony  of 
remorse,  though  his  Christian  biographer  declares  that 
his  last  moments  were  as  peaceful  and  unruffled  as  the 


THE    ILLUSIONS    OF    HISTOJIY.  217 

gentle  Addison's,  and  though  some  of  Hume's  more 
intelligent  enemies  have  asserted  that  in  jesting  about 
Charon  and  the  boat,  and  his  arguments  with  the  ferry 
man  to  let  him  off  a  little  longer,  the  Scottish  philoso 
pher  affected  an  indifference  which  he  did  not  feel!  It  is 
said  the  last  words  of  Louis  XV  to  Madame  Du  Barri 
were,  "  We  shall  meet  again  in  another  world."  "  A 
pleasant  rendezvous  he  is  giving  me!11  she  murmured; 
"  that  man  never  thought  of  any  one  but  himself."  Almost 
precisely  the  same  story  is  told  of  Louis  XIV  and  Madame 
Maintenon.  Among  the  last  words  of  Burns  were, 
"Don't  let  the  awkward  squad  fire  over  me,"  meaning  a 
body  of  local  militia,  of  which  he  was  a  member,  and 
whose  discipline  he,  to  the  last,  humorously  disparaged. 
It  is  reported  that  the  philosopher  Haller  kept  his  finger 
on  his  pulse  till  he  expired,  which  was  immediately  upon 
saying,  "  My  friend,  the  artery  ceases  to  beat."  Pitt's 
heart  was  broken  by  Austerlitz,  and  he  died  exclaiming, 
"Oh,  my  country!  how  I  leave  my  country!" 

It  is  a  popular  belief  that  Truth,  if  run  over  by  a 
locomotive  and  train,  gets  well;  while  Error  dies  of 
lockjaw,  if  it  but  scratches  its  finger.  But  facts  show 
this  to  be  an  illusion.  When  the  world  has  once  got 
hold  of  a  lie,  it  is  wonderful  how  hard  it  is  to  get  it 
out  of  the  world.  You  beat  it  on  the  head,  and  think 
it  has  given  up  the  ghost,  when  lo!  it  jumps  up  again, 
as  lively  and  thrifty  as  ever.  Bacon,  in  one  of  his 
weighty  essays,  after  remarking  that  truth  is  a  naked 
and  open  daylight,  that  does  not  show  the  masks,  and 
mummeries,  and  triumphs  of  the  world,  half  so  stately 
and  daintily  as  candle-lights,  adds,  that  "  a  mixture  of  a 
lie  doth  ever  add  pleasure."  Once  declare  to  the  world 
10 


218  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

that  Berkeley  denies  the  existence  of  matter,  and  all  over 
the  world  men  with  Berkeley  in  their  hands  will  echo  the 
absurdity.  Say  that  Locke  denies  all  knowledge  except 
through  the  medium  of  the  senses,  and  though  Locke  be 
studied  in  every  college,  the  statement  will  pass  unchal 
lenged.  Let  some  Fourth  of  July  Orator  quote  from 
Bacon  the  hackneyed  sentiment,  "  Knowledge  is  power," 
and  other  orators  will  ring  the  changes  upon  it  in  saecula 
saeculorum,  though  Bulwer  again  and  again  deny  that  the 
author  of  the  "  Instauration"  ever  penned  such  an  aphorism. 
Of  all  popular  fallacies  there  is  xio  one  more  frequently 
on  men's  lips  than  the  statement  thu*  l^con  was  the  father 
of  the  Inductive  Philosophy,  the  grand  founder  of  modern 
science.  But  it  may  be  doubted  whether  his  Novum 
Organon,  or  new  instrument  of  Philosophy,  was  really 
new  when  he  announced  it  as  such,  either  as  a  process 
followed  in  scientific  discovery,  or  as  a  theory  of  the  true 
method  of  discovery.  Bacon  was  neither  the  first  to  pro 
claim  the  barrenness  of  the  Aristotelian  philosophy,  nor 
is  his  the  glory  of  having  ended  the  reign  of  that  phi 
losophy  in  Europe.  He  but  hastened  the  downfall  of  a 
system  already  in  disrepute,  and  which  would  soon  have 
been  banished  from  the  schools  had  his  "  Instauration"  never 
been  published.  In  short,  as  De  Maistre  has  shown,  he 
was  a  barometer  that  announced  the  fine  weather  after  a 
long  period  of  storm  and  controversy;  and  because  he 
foretold  the  glorious  daylight  of  true  science  after  the 
darkness  of  the  middle  ages,  he  was  proclaimed  the  author 
of  it.  A  contemporary  called  him  truly  "the  prophet  of 
science."  "  I  have  seen,"  says  De  Maistre,  "  the  design  of  a 
medal  struck  in  his  honor,  the  body  of  which  is  a  rising 
sun,  with  the  inscription,  Exortus  uti  aetherius  sol  ('He 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  219 

rose  like  the  sun  in  the  sky ').  Nothing  is  more  plainly 
false.  Better  an  aurora,  with  the  inscription,  Nuncia 
soils  ('  Messenger  of  the  sun ') ;  and  even  this  would  be 
an  exaggeration,  for,  when  Bacon  rose,  it  was  at  least  ten 
o'clock  in  the  morning." 

How  often  do  we  hear  attributed  to  Sir  Eobert  Walpole 
the  execrable  saying,  "All  men  have  their  price.1'  Pope 
refers  to  it  in  the  lines: 

"  Would  he  oblige  me,  let  me  only  find 
He  does  not  think  me  what  he  thinks  mankind." 

But  the  "  Grand  Corrupter,"  as  he  was  nicknamed  by  his 
libelers,  uttered  no  such  sweeping  slander  against  his  fel 
low-men.  He  simply  declared  of  his  corrupt  opponents. 
"All  those  men  have  their  price,"  a  truth  as  unquestion 
able  as  his  alleged  maxim  was  false.  Again,  let  Lord 
Orrery  relate,  as  an  unquestionable  occurrence,  that  Dean 
Swift  once  began  the  service  when  nobody,  except  the 
clerk,  attended  his  church,  with  "  Dearly  beloved  Roger, 
the  scripture  moveth  you  and  me  in  sundry  places,"  and 
the  scandal  will  be  again  and  again  repeated,  though  a 
kinsman  of  the  Dean  show  that  it  was  published  of  another 
person  in  a  jest  book  before  Swift  was  born.  The  author 
of  "The  Tale  of  a  Tub"  and  "The  Battle  of  the  Books" 
was  not  so  destitute  of  originality  as  to  have  to  borrow  a 
joke  as  paltry  as  it  was  profane.  So  Swift  and  Butler  will 
forever  continue,  we  suppose,  to  divide  the  honors  of  the 
closing  couplet  of  the  epigram  on  the  feud  between  Handel 
and  Bononcini: 

"  Strange  that  all  this  difference  should  be 
'Twixt  Tweedledum  and  Tweedledee,— " 

though  neither  of  these  wits  was  the  author,  but  Dr.  By- 
rom,  of  Manchester.  As  "  to  him  that  hath  shall  be 


220  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

to  Butler,  so  long  as  the  world  is  infested  with  rascals,  will 
be  awarded  the  credit  of  Trumbuirs  sarcasm  on  the  Tories 
of  the  Revolution: 

"No  rogue  e'er  felt  the  halter  draw 
With  good  opinion  of  the  law." 

Among  the  hackneyed  quotations  of  the  day  is  the  line, 

"  Small  by  degrees,  and  beautifully  less," 

which  is  invariably  misquoted  from  "  Henry  and  Emma," 
a  parody  published  in  1721,  on  Matthew  Prior's  "  Nut 
Brown  Maid."  Describing  the  dress  of  Emma,  the  lover 
says: 

"No  longer  shall  the  bodice,  aptly  laced, 
From  thy  full  bosom  to  thy  slender  waist, 
That  air  of  harmony  and  shape  express, 
Fine  by  degrees,  and  beautifully  less." 

Another  current  quotation  which,  in  England  and 
France,  and  occasionally  in  this  country,  is  attributed  to 
Buffon,  is  this:  " Le  style,  c'est  Vhomme" — the  style  is  the 
man.  Even  Professor  Marsh,  in  his  lectures  on  the  English 
Language,  reproduces  the  misquotation,  which  asserts  a 
manifest  untruth.  What  Buffon  really  did  say  was  this: 
" Le  style  est  de  I'homme  meme" — " the  style  of  a  writer," 
that  is,  distinguished  from  the  contents  of  a  work,  which 
must  be  pushed  aside  by  fresh  discoveries,  "  is  his  own 
peculiar  contribution.1'  Perhaps  the  tritest  of  all  thread 
bare  quotations  is  the  saying,  "  There  is  but  one  step  from 
the  sublime  to  the  ridiculous;"  yet  even  of  this  the  pater 
nity  is  commonly  mistaken.  It  has  so  often  been  credited 
to  Napoleon,  instead  of  to  Thomas  Paine,  that  even  intelli 
gent  persons  are  puzzled  to  fix  the  authorship. 

It  has  been  well  observed  that  sometimes  an  invented 
pleasantry  passes  for  fact,  as  in  the  asparagus  and  oil  story 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  221 

of  Fontenelle.  Fontenelle, —  so  the  myth  runs, —  was  sup 
ping  with  a  friend  who  liked  oil,  which  the  former  dis 
liked.  It  was  agreed  that  half  the  asparagus  should  be 
dressed  with  oil,  and  half  without.  The  friend  dropped 
down  in  an  apoplectic  fit,  and  immediately  Fontenelle  hur 
ried  to  the  door,  and  called  out,  "Point  d'huile!"  —  "No 
oil!"  How  many  thousands  have  believed  the  malicious 
story  about  Gibbon,  that,  offering  himself  to  Mademoiselle 
Churchod  (afterwards  Madame  Neckar),  he  went  down  on 
his  knees,  and,  being  very  fat,  was  unable  to  get  up.  The 
simple  fact  is,  that  she  asked  him  why  he  did  not  go  down 
on  his  knees  to  her,  and  he  replied,  "  Because  you  would  be 
obliged  to  ring  for  your  footman  to  get  me  up  again." 

So  many  historic  sayings  have  never  been  uttered  by 
the  great  men  to  whom  they  have  been  attributed,  that  we 
need  not  be  astonished  if  we  one  day  learn  that  Caesar's 
"Veni,  vidi,  vici"  is  a  myth;  that  Perry  never  wrote  the 
immortal  words,  "  We  have  met  the  enemy,  and  they  are 
ours;"  and  that  Lawrence's  "Don't  give  up  the  ship!"  is 
an  old  sailor's  yarn.  Indeed,  Napoleon,  who  understood 
the  military  skill  of  "  the  foremost  man  of  all  the  world," 
ridiculed  as  absurd  that  saying  of  the  great  Julius  to  the 
pilot  in  a  storm,  "  What  do  you  fear?  You  carry  Caesar!" 
Americans,  at  least  American  musical  critics,  are  not  ex 
cessively  proud  of  "  Yankee  Doodle,  either  the  words  or  the 
tune;  but  the  poor  honor  of  its  composition,  it  seems,  is 
not  ours.  The  song  and  tune  date  back  to  the  wars  of 
Roundhead  and  Cavalier.  An  early  version  of  the  words 
in  England  runs: 

"Nankee  Doodle  came  to  town 

Upon  a  Kentish  pony; 
He  stuck  a  feather  in  his  hat, 
And  called  him  Macaroni." 


222  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

The  English,  it  is  said,  borrowed  the  song  from  Germany, 
and  it  was  introduced  to  America  as  a  martial  or  national 
air  by  a  Dr.  Shackburg,  a  surgeon  of  the  regular  troops  at 
Albany,  who  was  so  struck  by  the  outre  appearance  of  the 
raw  colonial  levies  gathered  there  in  1755  for  the  attack 
on  the  French  posts  of  Niagara  and  Frontenac,  that  he 
quizzically  prepared  a  song  for  them  to  the  tune  of  Yankee 
Doodle,  which  they  at  once  adopted  as  their  own.  It  would 
be  easy  to  multiply  these  illustrations,  but  we  will  add  but 
one  more, —  the  over-hackneyed  piece  of  nonsense  attrib 
uted  to  Archimedes,  that  give  him  a  place  to  stand  on  with 
his  lever,  and  he  would  move  the  world.  This  is  one  of  the 
standard  allusions,  a  part  of  the  necessary  stock-in-trade 
of  all  orators  and  newspaper- writers ;  and  persons,  when 
ever  they  meet  with  it,  think  of, Archimedes  as  an  extra 
ordinarily  great  man, —  a  giant  of  the  intellectual  giants, 
—  and  cry,  "  Really,  how  wonderful ! " 

Now,  it  is  a  well-known  principle  of  mechanical  forces 
that  the  velocities  at  the  extremities  of  a  lever  are  recip 
rocally  as  the  weights  at  those  extremities,  and  the  lengths 
of  the  arms  directly  as  those  same  velocities.  So  it  has 
been  shown  that  if,  at  the  moment  when  Archimedes  ut 
tered  his  memorable  saying,  God  had  taken  him  at  his 
word  by  furnishing  him  with  place,  prop,  and  lever, 
also  with  materials  of  sufficient  strength,  together  with 
a  counter- weight  of  two  hundred  pounds, —  the  fulcrum 
being  at  three  thousand  leagues  from  the  centre  of  the 
earth, —  the  great  geometer  would  have  required  a  lever 
of  twelve  quadrillions  of  miles  long,  and  a  velocity  at 
the  extremity  of  the  long  arm  equal  to  that  of  a  cannon 
ball,  to  raise  the  earth  one  inch  in  twenty-seven  trill 
ions  of  years!  Yet  will  this  exposure  of' the  colossal  ab- 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY.  223 

surdity  be  of  any  use?  Of  not  the  slightest.  Orators  will 
continue  to  employ  this  bravura  of  rhetoric,  and  men  will 
continue  to  gape  with  astonishment  at  the  boast  of  Archi 
medes,  as  if  he  had  been  foolish  enough  to  make  it, —  of 
which,  out  of  Plutarch,  there  is  no  proof  whatever. 

The  Roman  poet,  Horace,  tells  of  a  crazy  citizen  of 
Argos  who  fancied  that  he  sat  in  a  theatre,  seeing  and 
applauding  wonderful  tragedies.  Being  cured  of  his  mad 
ness  by  his  friends  with  a  dose  of  hellebore,  instead  of 
thanking  them,  he  was  indignant,  and  exclaimed,  "  By 
Pollux,  you  have  killed  me,  not  saved  me,  in  thus  robbing 
me  of  my  pleasure,  and  expelling  from  my  mind  a  most 
delightful  illusion ! "  Not  unlike  this,  we  fear,  have  been 
the  feelings  of  the  reader,  while  we  have  been  disabusing 
him,  perhaps,  of  some  of  his  historical  hallucinations.  Cui 
bono?  Of  what  use  is  it  thus  to  throw  all  our  heroes  and 
heroines  into  the  crucible?  Are  you  sure  that,  as  Dryden 
said  of  Shakspeare,  burn  them  down  as  you  will,  there  will 
always  be  precious  metal  at  the  bottom  of  the  melting  pot? 
Can  we  be  confident  of  anything  that  is  told  us  of  past 
times?  Is  all  history  false?  or,  if  not,  how  are  we  to  dis 
criminate  the  gold  from  the  dross, —  the  reality  from  the 
counterfeit?  If  I  choose  to  believe  in  the  gaunt  she- wolf 
of  the  Tiber,  or  that  the  unhappy  Mary  of  Scotland  was 
as  good  as  she  was  beautiful,  what  harm  can  it  do  me? 
Why  must  I  be  pestered  into  the  conviction  that  the  first 
is  a  myth,  and  that  the  last  was  a  courtesan  and  a  mur 
deress?  Grant  that  the  heroism  of  a  Lucretia, —  of  a 
Mucius  Scsevola, —  is  a  fa-ble;  as  Goethe  says,  "if  the  Ro 
mans  were  great  enough  to  invent  such  stories,  we  should 
at  least  be  great  enough  to  believe  them."  If  it  be  true 
that  "where  ignorance  is  bliss,  'tis  folly  to  be  wise";  if 


224  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOEY. 

the  secret  of  all  earthly  bliss  lies  in  preserving  our  illu 
sions, —  in  contriving,  as  we  go  through  life,  not  to  be 
disenchanted;  how  can  you  expect  us  to  be  grateful  to, 
even  if  we  are  not  positively  angry  with,  the  Niebuhrs,  the 
Lewises,  and  other  historical  big-wigs,  who  have  dethroned 
so  many  of  our  idols?  Is  history  so  rich  in  noble  deeds 
and  utterances,  that  we  can  afford  to  lose  any  of  the  god 
like  acts,  any  of  the  sparkling  jests,  the  happy  inspirations, 
the  thrilling  improvisations,  of  great  and  good  men?  Are 
not  these  "  fables,"  as  you  call  them,  almost  the  only  poetry 
the  State  and  county  taxes  have  not  crushed  out  of  our 
hearts?  Nay,  can  we  spare  a  single  epigram? 

In  reply,  let  us  say,  first,  that,  in  spite  of  all  we  have 
said,  the  substance  of  history  remains  intact.  As  in  the 
case  of  money,  the  very  word  counterfeit  implies  the  ex 
istence  of  a  true, —  nay,  that  the  great  mass  of  silver  or 
gold  coin  is  genuine, —  so  with  the  stories  of  the  nations. 
Again,  let  us  remember  that  the  spirit  of  inquiry  and 
the  spirit  of  scepticism  are  as  widely  removed  as  the 
poles.  The  same  relentless  iconoclasm.  the  same  search 
ing  spirit  of  inquiry,  which  cheats  us  of  many  of  our 
fond  illusions,  may  also  relieve  human  nature  of  countless 
unjust  stigmas  of  meanness,  stupidity,  cowardice,  and 
cruelty. 

Again,  as  the  value  of  the  real  gem  is  enhanced  by 
the  exposure  of  the  counterfeit, —  as  the  Dutch,  by  de 
stroying  one-half  of  their  spice  trees,  increased  the  value 
of  the  entire  crop, —  so  will  the  common  stock  of  recorded 
or  traditional  wit,  virtue,  and  heroism,  be  rather  increased 
in  value  than  depreciated  by  the  illusion-destroying  pro 
cess  to  which  history  has  been  subjected  by  modern 
criticism.  The  occasional  loss  of  a  charming  error  will 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  HISTORY.  225 

be  compensated,  and  more  than  compensated,  by  the 
habits  of  sharpness  and  accuracy  we  shall  acquire,  by 
challenging  every  story  which  taxes  our  credulity.  We 
are  aware  that  it  is  sometimes  said  that  ignorance  is  the 
mother  of  admiration.  If  this  be  so,  then  it  follows  that 
one  of  the  noblest  and  healthiest  exercises  of  the  mind 
rests  chiefly  on  a  deceit  and  a  delusion, —  that,  with  fuller 
knowledge,  all  our  enthusiasm  would  cease;  whereas,  in 
fact,  for  once  that  ignorance  leads  us  to  admire  that 
which,  with  fuller  insight,  we  should  perceive  to  be  a 
cheat  or  a  sham,  a  hundred,  nay,  a  thousand  times,  it 
prevents  us  from  admiring  that  which  is  admirable  in 
deed.  While,  therefore,  some  eyes  will  look  sorrowfully 
upon  this  reformation, —  will  regard  it,  in  the  fine  image 
of  Landor,  like  breaking  off  a  crystal  from  the  vault  of 
a  twilight  cavern,  out  of  mere  curiosity  to  see  where 
the  accretion  ends  and  the  rock  begins, —  others  will  agree 
with  Dr.  Johnson,  that  the  value  of  a  story  depends  on 
its  truth;  on  its  being  a  picture  of  an  individual,  as  of 
human  nature  in  general;  and  that,  if  it  be  false,  it 
is  a  picture  of  nothing. 

Lady  Mary  Wortley  Montagu  closes  one  of  her  letters 
with  the  remark:  "There  is  nothing  can  pay  one  for 
that  valuable  ignorance  which  is  the  companion  of  youth. 
...  To  my  extreme  mortification,  I  find  that  I  am 
growing  wiser  and  wiser  every  day.11  But  does  any  sen 
sible  man  regret, —  or  any  sensible  woman,  in  this  age 
of  Somervilles,  Stowes,  and  Martineaus, —  that  he  is  no 
longer  cheated  by  the  fictions  that  amused  his  childhood? 
—  that  he  has  ceased  to  believe  that  Romulus  and  Remus 
were  suckled  by  a  wolf,  and  that  Jack-the-Giant-killer, 
Sinbad  the  Sailor,  and  Robinson  Crusoe,  were  flesh-and- 


226  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTORY. 

blood  personages?  If  not,  why  should  he  mourn  because 
some  relentless  investigator  threatens  to  sweep  away  the 
myths  that  have  deceived  his  maturer  judgment  by  sug 
gesting  grave  doubts  whether  Curtius  did  actually  jump 
into  the  gulf,  or  whether  there  was  any  gulf  for  him  to 
leap  into;  whether  Portia  swallowed  live  coals;  whether 
Xerxes  cut  a  canal  through  Mount  Athos,  and  clouded 
the  sun  with  the  arrows  of  his  soldiers;  whether  Codes 
defended  a  bridge,  single-handed,  against  an  entire  army; 
whether  Rome  was  saved  by  a  goose,  and  captured  by  a 
hare;  whether  Hannibal  levelled  rocks,  and  Cleopatra 
dissolved  pearls,  with  vinegar;  whether  Belisarius  did  beg 
an  obolus  in  the  streets  of  Constantinople;  whether 
Scsevola  burned  his  right  hand,  or  Regulus  died  a  heroic 
death;  whether  Zisca's  skin  was  made  into  a  drum-head; 
whether  Columbus's  egg  had  not  tried  its  trick  of  bal 
ancing  long  before  the  fifteenth  century;  whether  he  did 
not  first  discover  Watling  Island,  instead  of  Cat  Island 
(or  San  Salvador),  and  whether  the  Norwegians  were  not 
500  years  ahead  of  him;  whether  Alfred  really  burnt  the 
cakes,  and  went  disguised  into  the  Danish  camp;  whether 
Hengist  and  Horsa,  Rowena  and  Vortigern,  are  not 
shadows;  whether  Cromwell's  dead  body  was  hung  in 
chains  at  Tyburn;  whether  there  was  really  a  Pope  Joan? 
and  whether  Captain  John  Smith  had  more  lives  than 
ten  cats,  and  was  saved  by  Pocahontas. 

Within  a  few  years  it  has  been  found,  by  the  discov 
ery  of  the  Sinaitic  *and  other  very  ancient  manuscripts 
of  the  New  Testament,  that  some  of  its  most  admired 
passages  are  forgeries, —  mediaeval  additions  to  the  origi 
nal  text.  It  is  sad  to  learn  that  the  story  of  the  woman 
taken  in  adultery  is  a  myth.  It  is  sadder  still  to  learn 


THE   ILLUSIONS   OF   HISTOKY.  227 

that  the  utterance  of  our  Lord  on  the  cross,  "  Father, 
forgive  them,  for  they  know  not  what  they  do,"  is  not  to 
be  found  in  some  of  the  old  manuscripts,  and  that  the 
words  in  the  Sermon  on  the  Mount,  in  Matt,  v,  44, — 
"  Bless  them  that  curse  you,  do  good  to  them  that  hate 
you,  and  pray  for  them  which  despitefully  use  you,1' — 
words  which  lie  at  the  very  foundation  of  Christian  mo 
rality, — must  be  swept  away  from  the  sacred  text.  What, 
then,  shall  we  do?  Shall  we  throw  aside  our  Testaments, 
or  shall  we  weep  over  the  loss  of  these  precious  verses? 
What,  indeed,  do  we  want?  Is  it  the  interpolations  of 
monks,  or  the  very  words,  the  exact  language,  of  Matthew, 
Mark,  Luke,  and  John,  without  a  syllable  or  a  letter 
added  or  removed?  For  ourselves,  we  thank  God  for 
every  exposure  of  a  forgery,  whether  in  His  book  or  in 
man's  books;  and  to  our  mind  the  most  cogent  proof 
that  the  Holy  Scriptures  are  from  Him,  is  the  fact  that 
while  other  histories  have  been  found  to  swarm  with 
errors,  they,  when  subjected  to  the  intensest,  most  micro 
scopic  scrutiny  of  modern  criticism,  have  come  forth  from 
the  ordeal  substantially  unscathed. 

God  grant  that  the  day  may  never  come  when  we 
shall  adopt  the  Jesuitical  doctrine  of  Infidelity's  latest 
champion,  Renan.  "  For  the  success  of  what  is  good," 
he  tells  us  in  his  "  Life  of  Jesus,"  "  less  pure  ways  are 
necessary";  "the  best  cause  is  only  won  by  ill  means; 
we  must  accept  men  as  they  are,  with  all  their  illusions, 
and  thus  endeavor  to  work  upon  them;  France  would 
not  be  what  it  is,  if  it  had  not  for  a  thousand  years 
believed  in  the  flask  of  holy  oil  at  Rheims;  when  we  with 
our  scrupulous  regard  for  truth  have  accomplished  what  the 
heroes  did  by  their  deceptions,  then,  and  not  till  then,  shall 


228  THE   ILLUSIONS   OF  HISTORY. 

we  have  a  right  to  blame  them;  the  only  culprit  in  such 
cases  is  mankind,  who  wants  to  be  cheated."  (The  italics 
are  ours).  So,  according  to  this  unblushing  apostle  of 
fraud,  we  are  not  to  believe  with  John  Milton  that 
"Truth  is  strong,  next  to  the  Almighty;  she  needs  no 
policies,  nor  stratagems,  nor  licensings,  to  make  her  vic 
torious."  Instead  of  destroying  the  delusions  of  our  fel 
low  men,  we  must  use  them  cunningly,  cheat  those  who 
want  to  be  cheated,  and  rouge  and  powder,  if  need  be, 
the  face  of  Truth  herself,  to  make  her  attractive.  And 
this  is  the  morality  of  a  French  democrat  who  would 
have  us  give  up  our  Bibles!  Let  us  cultivate  a  reverent 
love  for  Truth, —  pure  Truth,  without  gloss,  alloy,  or 
adulteration.  Let  us  seek  to  know  "  the  truth,  the  whole 
Truth,  and  NOTHING  BUT  THE  TRUTH,"  in  history,  in  sci 
ence,  in  literature,  and  in  religion,  at  whatever  sacrifice 
of  our  prejudices,  or  whatever  havoc  it  may  make  with 
our  fondly- cherished  illusions;  for,  if  there  is  any  truth 
which  all  the  experience  of  the  past  thunders  in  our  ears, 
it  is  that  falsehood  is  moral  poison, —  that  any  short-lived 
pleasure  which  we  may  derive  from  cheating  ourselves 
or  from  being  cheated,  will  be  dearly  paid  for  by  the 
disappointment  and  anguish  which  will  be  ours  when  the 
veil  shall  be  torn  away,  and  we  shall  see  things  as  they 
are. 


HOMILIES   ON  EARLY  RISING. 


A  MONG  the  favorite  topics  of  newspaper  declamation, 
«OL  there  is  none  upon  which  certain  moralists  of  the 
press  are  fonder  of  preaching  a  quarterly  homily,  than 
upon  the  importance  of  early  rising.  Of  course,  the  argu 
ments  for  the  practice  are  the  old,  hackneyed,  stereotyped 
ones  upon  which  the  changes  have  been  rung  a  thousand 
times, — "  straw  that  has  been  threshed  a  hundred  times 
without  wheat,"  as  Carlyle  would  say.  "  Early  to  bed,  and 
early  to  rise,"  etc.  There  is  a  freshness,  a  briskness,  a 
sparkling  liveliness  in  the  first  hours  of  the  day,  which  all 
the  subsequent  ones  lack ;  let  it  stand  but  an  hour  or  two, 
and  it  is  already  settled  upon  its  lees;  it  is  stale,  flat,  and 
vapid.  Again,  the  early  riser  seizes  the  day  by  the  forelock ; 
he  drives  it,  instead  of  being  driven,  or  rather  dragged 
along,  by  it.  Then,  all  the  great  men, —  especially  those 
who  have  distinguished  themselves  in  literature,  science, 
and  the  arts, —  were  early  risers.  Homer,  Virgil,  Horace, 
among  the  ancients,  and  Paley,  Priestly,  Parkhurst,  and 
Franklin,  among  the  moderns,  all  left  their  pillows  early. 
Sir  Thomas  More  and  Bishops  Jewel  and  Burnet  sprang 
upon  their  feet  at  four  in  the  morning.  The  Great 
Frederic  of  Prussia,  Charles  the  Twelfth  of  Sweden,  and 
Napoleon,  were  early  risers.  "  When  you  begin  to  turn 
in  bed,"  said  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  "it  is  time  to  turn 
out."  Jefferson  declared  at  the  close  of  his  life,  "  The  sun 
has  not  caught  me  in  bed  for  fifty  years." 


230  HOMILIES   ON   EARLY   RISING. 

Did  not  Sir  Walter  Scott  write  all  his  great  novels 
before  breakfast,  and  was  it  not  in  the  same  early  hours 
that  Dr.  Albert  Barnes  penned  those  Commentaries  of 
which  a  million  volumes  have  been  sold  in  this  country 
and  Europe?  Was  it  not  between  the  hours  of  five  and 
eight  in  the  morning  that  John  Quincy  Adams  penned  most 
of  his  public  papers?  Was  it  not  in  the  same  three  hours 
that  Gibbon  wrote  his  immortal  "  Decline  and  Fall,"  and 
has  not  Buffon  told  us  that  to  the  studies  of  those  three 
hours  daily  the  world  is  indebted  for  the  noble  work  which 
established  his  fame  as  the  greatest  of  'natural  historians? 
Did  not  Judge  Holt,  who  was  curious  concerning  longevity, 
and  questioned  every  old  man  that  came  before  him,  about 
his  modes  of  living,  find  that,  amid  all  their  different 
habits,  they  agreed  in  one  thing, — they  got  up  'betimes? 
These  stale  anecdotes,  eked  out  with  the  old  quotation  from 

Thomson, 

"Falsely  luxurious,  will  not  man  awake?" 

and  ether  passages  from  the  poets  in  which  they  try  to 
inveigle  people  from  their  beds  by  singing  of  the  beauty 
of  the  dappled  morn,  the  dewy  grass,  the  warbling  birds, 
and  preserving  a  studied  silence  concerning  the  rising  fog, 
the  chill  air,  and  the  raw,  underdone  feeling  of  the  world 
generally, —  comprise  all  the  arguments  which,  for  half  a 
century,  the  wit  of  the  early  risers  has  been  able  to  scrape 
together  for  the  practice. 

Now  all  this  may  carry  great  weight  with  some  people 
with  whom  an  uneasy  conscience,  an  overloaded  stomach, 
or  a  hard  bed,  may,  like  Macbeth,  "  murder  sleep."  It  is 
not  strange  that  your  old  bachelor,  who  is  happy  neither  in 
bed  nor  out, —  or  your  henpecked  husband,  who  dreads  a 
morning  curtain  lecture, —  or  your  ghostly,  pale-faced, 


HOMILIES   ON"   EAELY   RISING.  231 

dyspeptic  student,  who  fancies  that  by  rising  with  the  lark 
he  is  to  become  a  giant  in  law,  medicine,  or  theology, — 
cries  up  this  foolish  custom.  Making  a  merit  of  necessity, 
they  may  grow  grand  and  intolerant  on  the  strength  of 
their  virtue,  and  crow  like  chanticleer  over  those  who  can 
appreciate  the  luxury  of  "  t'other  doze."  But  those  who 
have  no  torturing  conscience,  dyspepsia,  or  "  Damien's  bed 
of  steel,"  to  make  Alcmena  nights  for  them,  are  not  to  be 
dragged  from  their  warm  pillows  on  such  pretences  as 
these.  Talk  of  the  healthiness  of  early  rising!  Who  can 
believe  that  such  violent  changes  from  the  sleeping  to  the 
waking  state, —  from  warm  to  cold, —  are  beneficial  to  the 
system?  Why  is  it,  if  they  are  not  unnatural,  that  the 
poets,  refining  upon  the  torments  of  the  damned,  make 
one  of  their  greatest  agonies  to  consist  in  being  suddenly 
transported  from  heat  to  cold,  from  fire  to  ice?  Are  they 
not,  at  certain  revolutions,  according  to  Milton,  "  haled  out 
of  their  beds"  by  "  harpy- footed  furies," — fellows  by  whom 
they  are  made  to 

"  -feel  by  turns  the  bitter  change 
Of  fierce  extremes,  extremes  by  change  more  fierce"? 

"  But  think,"  we  hear  some  one  exclaim,  "  of  the 
amount  of  time  saved  by  early  rising"!  When  all  other 
arguments  are  exhausted,  the  early  riser  will  call  for 
slate  and  pencil,  and  proceed  to  prove  to  you  by  a  painful 
arithmetical  calculation  that  you  may  add  some  six  or 
seven  years  to  your  life  by  crawling  out  of  bed  at  five 
o'clock  instead  of  seven.  Of  course,  he  makes  it  con 
venient  to  forget,  in  his  calculation,  the  two  hours  one 
loses  by  hurrying  to  bed  that  much  sooner,  in  order  to 
humor  his  foolish  eccentricity;  as  if  one  should  try  to 
lengthen  a  yard-stick  by  cutting  off  a  foot  from  one  end 


232  HOMILIES   ON  EARLY   RISING. 

and  adding  it  to  the  other.  Admitting  that  we  may  add  to 
our  days  by  rising  early,  is  the  longest  life  necessarily  the 
best?  Or  is  it  desirable  to  spin  out  one's  years  to  three 
score  and  ten,  if,  to  do  so,  he  must  cheat  himself  of  all 
life's  comforts  and  luxuries, —  abjure  his  morning  snooze, 
"feed  on  pulse,  and  nothing  wear  but  frieze"?  The  lapse 
of  years  alone  is  not  life;  we  should  count  time  by  heart 
throbs, —  by  the  number  of  delicious  or  pleasing  sensations. 
As  to  one's  growing  wealthy  by  early  rising,  we  leave  it 
to  the  candle-end-saving  economists  to  say  whether  it  is 
cheaper  to  keep  one's  self  warm  by  coal  at  ten  dollars  a 
ton  than  between  a  mattress  bed  and  comforters.  Recollect 
that  you  wear  out  no  clothes,  consume  no  oil,  eat  no  break 
fasts,  while  you  are  coquetting  with  "  tired  nature's  sweet 
restorer."  Then,  as  to  growing  wise  by  early  rising, —  has 
not  knowledge-seeking  been  associated,  from  time  imme 
morial,  with  the  midnight  oil?  Have  not  all  the  great 
works  of  genius  which  have  conferred  immortality  on  their 
authors,  been  written  while  the  rest  of  the  world  was 
hushed  in  slumber, —  in  the  "wee  small  hours  ayant  the 
'twal "  ?  Is  not  every  elaborate  literary  production  said 
to  smell  of  the  lamp,  thus  showing  that,  in  the  opinion  of 
authors  and  critics,  Apollo  has  no  time  to  attend  to  his 
votaries  until  he  has  unharnessed  his  steeds  from  the 
chariot  of  the  sun?  Did  not  Pope's  best  thoughts  come 
to  him,  like  owls,  in  the  night-time;  and  did  not  Swift, 
according  to  a  contemporary,  "  lie  abed  till  eleven  o'  clock, 
and  think  of  wit  for  the  day"?  But,  admitting  an  excep 
tion  or  two  to  the  general  rule, —  because  Sir  Walter  Scott 
wrote  whole  books  before  breakfast,  is  anyone  foolish 
enough  to  natter  himself  that  he  can  dash  off  Waverleys 
and  Ivanhoes  simply  by  striking  a  light  at  four  in  the 


HOMILIES   OK  EARLY   RISIKGL  233 

morning, — poscente  ante  diem  librum  cum  lumine?  Boobies 
and  dunces  will  be  boobies  and  dunces  still,  though  they 
keep  their  eyes  wide  open  from  January  to  December. 
Early  rising  will  no  more  convert  a  fool  into  a  wise  man, — 
a  commonplace  man  into  a  man  of  genius, —  than  eating 
opium  will  make  him  a  Coleridge  or  a  DeQuincey.  The 
examples  of  Frederic  the  Great  and  the  Emperor  Napoleon 
may  weigh  with  their  admirers;  but  we  believe  it  would 
have  been  far  better  for  humanity  if  they  had  loved  their 
pillows.  It  was  only  after  a  desperate  and  most  unnatural 
struggle  that  the  former  triumphed  in  his  youth  over  the 
charms  of  sleep,  which  he  found  it  harder  to  resist  than  in 
after  life  to  rout  the  Austrians ;  and  he  succeeded  only  by 
invoking  the  assistance  of  an  old  domestic  whom  he  charged, 
on  pain  of  dismissal,  to  pull  him  out  of  bed  every  morning 
at  two  o'clock.  As  to  the  poet  Thomson's  panegyrics  on 
early  rising,  who  usually  snored  away  the  whole  forenoon 
in  bed,  and  was  so  lazy  that  he  used  to  eat  peaches  from  the 
trees  in  his  garden  with  his  hands  in  his  waistcoat  pocket, — 
literally  browsing,  like  a  giraffe, —  our  judgment  of  his 
counsel  is  pithily  expressed  by  an  American  poet,  Saxe: 

"Thomson,  who  sang  about  the  Seasons,  said 
It  is  a  glorious  thing  to  rise  in  season; 
But  then  he  said  it,— lying,— in  his  bed 

At  ten  o'clock  A.  M.,— the  very  reason 
He  wrote  so  charmingly.     The  simple  fact  is, 
His  preaching  wasn't  sanctioned  by  his  practice." 

It  is  very  well  to  "take  Time  by  the  forelock1';  but 
what  if,  in  the  eifort  to  do  so,  one  exhausts  himself  too 
much  to  hold  him?  George  Eliot,  in  one  of  her  novels, 
portrays  a  thrifty  farmer's  wife  who  rose  so  early  in  the 
morning  to  do  her  work,  that  by  ten  o'clock  it  was  all 
over,  and  she  was  at  her  wits'  end  to  know  what  to  do 


234  HOMILIES   ON   EARLY   RISING. 

with  her  day.  No  doubt  it  is  "  the  early  bird  that  catches 
the  worm";  but,  as  the  pillow-loving  boy  said  to  his  father, 
"  it  is  the  early  worm  that  gets  caught."  Intemperance 
in  early-rising,  like  every  other  excess,  is  sure  to  bring 
its  penalty  along  with  it.  Nature  will  not  be  cheated 
out  of  her  dues,  and  if  they  are  not  paid  in  season,  she 
will  exact  them,  with  compound  interest,  out  of  season. 
It  is  well  known  that  the  early  riser  often  compensates 
himself  for  his  greeting  to  the  dawn  by  frequent  naps 
in  the  afternoon  or  evening.  Josiah  Quincy  tells  us  in 
the  "  Life  "  of  his  father,  that  the  latter  rose  every  morn 
ing  in  winter  and  summer,  for  many  years,  at  four 
o'clock.  The  effect  of  this  outrage  upon  Nature  was  that 
he  was  sure  to  drop  to  sleep,  wherever  he  was,  when  his 
mind  was  not  actively  occupied, —  sometimes  even  in  com 
pany,  when  the  conversation  flagged,  and  always  as  soon 
as  he  took  his  seat  in  his  gig  or  sulky,  in  which  he  drove 
to  town.  John  Quincy  Adams,  who  was  addicted  to  the 
same  vice  of  intemperate  early  rising,  with  similar  con 
sequences,  once  accompanied  him  to  the  Harvard  Law 
School,  to  hear  Judge  Story  lecture.  "  Now  Judge  Story," 
continues  the  biographer,  "  did  not  accept  the  philosophy 
of  his  two  friends  in  this  particular,  and  would  insist 
that  it  was  a  more  excellent  way  to  take  out  one's  allow 
ance  of  sleep  in  bed,  and  be  wide  awake  when  out  of  it, — 
which  he  himself  most  assuredly  always  was.  The  Judge 
received  the  two  Presidents  gladly,  and  placed  them  in 
the  seat  of  honor  on  the  dais  by  his  side,  fronting  the 
class,  and  proceeded  with  his  lecture.  It  was  not  long 
before,  glancing  his  eye  aside  to  see  how  his  guests  were 
impressed  by  his  doctrine,  he  saw  that  they  were  both  of 
them  sound  asleep,  and  he  saw  that  the  class  saw  it  too. 


HOMILIES   ON   EARLY   BISIKG.  235 

Pausing  a  moment  in  his  swift  career  of  speech,  he  pointed 
to  the  two  sleeping  figures,  and  uttered  these  words  of 
warning:  'Gentlemen,  you  see  before  you  a  melancholy 
example  of  the  evil  effects  of  early  rising!'  The  shout 
of  laughter  with  which  this  judicial  obiter  dictum  was 
received  effectually  aroused  the  sleepers,  and  it  is  to  be 
hoped  that  they  heard  and  profited  by  the  remainder  of 
the  discourse." 

There  is  a  class  of  moralists  at  the  present  day  with 
whom  it  is  a  favorite  dogma  that  no  one  can  ever  reach 
a  high  degree  of  goodness  except  by  passing  through  a 
certain  number  of  self-imposed  trials.  It  has  been  justly 
said  of  such  persons  that  their  whole  mind  seems  wrapt 
up  in  the  office  of  polishing  up  little  moral  pins  and 
needles,  and  running  them  into  the  most  tender  parts  of 
their  skins.  It  is  chiefly  men  of  this  stamp  who  advo 
cate  the  heresy  of  early  rising.  Were  they  content  to 
stick  pins  into  themselves,  we  would  leave  them  to  get 
all  the  moral  discipline  that  is  possible  from  the  practice. 
But  they  insist  on  other  persons  imitating  them;  and 
what  is  more  offensive,  they  are  continually  putting  on 
airs  on  account  of  their  eccentricity.  Not  content  with 
"shaking  hands  with  himself  mentally,"  and  thinking  he 
has  done  a  great  thing,  the  early  riser  must  vaunt  him 
self  of  his  achievements  herein.  Indeed,  there  are  few 
things  in  the  way  of  bragging  that  will  compare  with 
what  an  English  essayist  calls  "  the  insulting  triumph, 
the  outrageous  animation  of  the  man  who  has  dressed  by 
candle-light  in  the  month  of  December."  It  is  not  mere 
ly  that  he  speaks  of  the  exploit  with  a  chuckle,  or  the 

"  —  sort  of  satisfaction 
Men  feel  when  they've  done  a  noble  action." 


236  HOMILIES   ON   EAELY   BISItfG. 

but  he  looks  down  upon  you  who  hug  your  pillow,  with 
an  air  of  superiority,  as  if  you  lacked  moral  backbone, 
or  were  a  pigmy  in  virtue. 

There  is  a  caustic  proverb,  "  We  are  all  good  risers 
at  night,1'  which  strikingly  shows  how  unnatural  is  this 
practice  of  getting  up  early.  We  have  long  been  puzzled 
to  account  for  the  origin  of  so  disagreeable  a  practice; 
but  a  recent  English  writer  suggests  an  explanation  which 
is  as  satisfactory  as  it  is  original  and  ingenious.  For  those 
who  have  to  labor  in  the  fields,  or  to  get  their  living  by 
hunting,  there  are  obvious  advantages  in  making  the  most 
of  the  daylight.  Now  philosophers  have  remarked  that  an 
instinct,  like  a  physical  organ,  often  survives  after  its 
original  function  has  become  unimportant.  Animals  retain 
rudimentary  claws  or  wings  which  have  become  perfectly 
useless,  a  legacy  from  their  remote  ancestors;  a  dog  still 
turns  himself  three  times  around  before  he  lies  down, 
because  his  great-great-grandfathers  did  so  in  the  days 
when  they  were  wild  beasts,  roaming  amongst  the  long 
grass;  and  every  tamed  animal  preserves  for  a  time 
certain  instincts  which  were  useful  to  him  only  in  his 
wild  state.  The  sentiment  about  early  rising  is  such  a 
traditionary  instinct,  which  has  wandered  into  an  era 
where  it  is  not  wanted. 


LITERARY  TRIFLERS. 


A  HISTORY  of  the  misdirected  labors  of  the  human 
•*-«V  race  would  form  one  of  the  most  curious  and  in 
structive,  as  well  as  one  of  the  most  voluminous,  books 
that  could  be  compiled.  It  would  show  that,  while  util 
ity  has  been  a  sharp  spur  to  human  effort,  difficulty  and 
the  love  of  praise  have  furnished  motives  equally  power 
ful.  Not  to  speak  of  the  pyramids,  those  mountains  of 
masonry,  which,  though  costing  the  labors  of  thousands 
for  many  years,  serve  only  as  monuments  of  human 
folly;  or  of  huge  walls  stretching  along  the  length  of  an 
empire ;  or  of  the  costly  monuments  reared  to  perpetuate 
the  memory  of  things  which  men  should  be  anxious  to 
forget;  or  of  the  oceans  of  time  wasted  in  the  profitless 
researches  of  astrology,  magic,  quadrature  of  the  circle, 
perpetual  motion,  etc.;  let  us  glance  for  a  few  moments 
at  some  of  the  fruits  of  a  similar  folly  in  the  literary 
world.  Here,  after  all,  will  be  found  the  most  prodigal 
waste  of  time  and  labor,  as  the  far-stretching  Saharas  of 
useless,  and  worse  than  useless,  books  that  greet  the  eye 
in  every  Bodleian  library  will  testify.  There  are  authors 
who  have  written  hundreds  of  volumes,  folio,  quarto,  and 
octavo,  full  of  the  veriest  commonplace,  and  which  now 
not  only  sleep  quietly  and  undisturbed  on  the  shelves, 
but  which  respect  for  the  human  understanding  compels 
us  to  believe  could  never  have  found  even  yawning 

readers. 

337 


238  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

Perhaps  theology  may  claim  to  be  the  Arabia  of  liter 
ature,  for  here  are  far-reaching  wastes  or  Great  Deserts 
of  books,  in  which,  could  he  live  as  long  as  the  ante 
diluvians,  one  might  travel  for  ages,  without  finding 
a  single  verdant  spot  to  relieve  the  eye  or  cheat  the 
painful  journey.  In  one  of  the  immense  libraries  of 
Continental  Europe  there  is  pointed  out  to  the  traveler 
one  entire  side  of  a  long  hall  filled  with  nothing  but 
treatises  on  a  certain  mystical  point  in  divinity,  all  of 
which  are  now  but  so  much  old  lumber,  neglected  even 
by  the  antiquary,  and  fit  only  for  the  pastry-cook  or  the 
trunk-maker.  As  space  is  limitless,  and  there  are  large 
chasms  of  it  still  unfilled  by  tangible  bodies,  it  may 
seem  cruel  to  grudge  these  writings  the  room  they  oc 
cupy.  Yet  one  cannot  but  lament  such  an  enormous 
waste  of  labor,  nor  with  the  utmost  stretch  of  charity 
can  he  refrain  from  believing  that,  though  Nature  may 
have  abhorred  a  vacuum  in  the  days  of  Aristotle,  her 
feelings  must  have  greatly  changed  since  mediocrity  has 
filled  it  with  so  wretched  apologies  for  substance  and 
form. 

The  celebrated  William  Prynne,  whose  ears  were  cut 
off  by  Charles  I,  wrote  about  200  books,  nearly  all  ele 
phantine  folios  or  bulky  quartos,  not  one  of  which  the 
most  inveterate  literary  mouser  of  our  day  ever  peeps 
into.  In  1786  the  Rev.  William  Davy,  an  obscure  curate 
in  Devonshire,  began  writing  a  "  System  of  Divinity," 
as  he  termed  it,  in  twenty-six  volumes,  which,  being 
unable  to  find  a  publisher,  he  resolved  to  print  with  his 
own  hands.  With  a  few  old  types  and  a  press  made  by 
himself,  he  began  the  work  of  typography,  printing  only 
a  page  at  a  time.  For  twelve  long  years  he  pursued 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  239 

his  extraordinary  labors,  and  at  last,  in  1807,  brought 
them  to  a  close.  As  each  volume  of  the  twenty-six  octavo 
volumes  of  his  work  contained  about  500  pages,  he  must 
have  imposed  and  distributed  his  types,  and  put  his  press 
into  operation  13,000  times,  or  considerably  more  than 
three  times  a  day,  omitting  Sundays,  during  the  long 
period  of  his  task, —  an  amount  of  toil  without  remuner 
ation  which  almost  staggers  belief.  Only  fourteen  copies 
were  printed,  which  he  bound  with  his  own  hands,  and 
a  few  of  which  he  deposited  in  the  public  libraries  of 
London.  He  died  at  an  advanced  age  in  1826,  hoping 
to  the  last  for  a  favorable  verdict  from  posterity,  though 
even  the  existence  of  his  magnum  opus, —  magnum  in 
size  only, —  is  probably  not  known  to  ten  men  in  Great 
Britain. 

But  it  is  not  in  the  literary  productions  of  the  eighteenth 
or  nineteenth  century,  but  in  those  of  the  sixteenth  and 
seventeenth,  that  are  to  be  found  some  of  the  most  signal 
examples  of  misdirected  intellectual  labor.  We  refer  to 
those  torturing  experiments  upon  language  called  ana 
grams,  chronograms,  echoes,  macaronies,  bouts-rimes,  acros 
tics,  palindromes,  alliterative  verses,  etc.,  which  were  poured 
forth  in  floods,  not  by  mere  flippant  idlers,  or  dunces 
who  deemed  themselves  wits,  but  often  by  scholars  of  bril 
liant  abilities  and  attainments.  Weary  of  the  search  after 
ideas,  disgusted  with  great  speculations  that  ended  in 
doubt,  and  dissatisfied  with  wisdom  that  brought  no  heart's 
ease,  and  knowledge  that  only  increased  sorrow,  the  think 
ing  men  of  those  ages,  like  their  predecessors  of  more 
ancient  times,  often  employed  their  leisure  moments  in 
the  composition  of  laborious  trifles, —  magno  conatu  magnas 
nugas, —  which  mocked  the  fruits  of  their  graver  studies 


240  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

with  something  of  a  fairy  quaintness.  Follies  of  this 
kind  date  back,  indeed,  almost  to  the  invention  of  letters. 
The  Greeks  had  their  lipogrammatists,  who  could  write 
elaborate  poems  or  treatises  from  which  a  particular  let 
ter  was  excluded.  An  ancient  poetaster  wrote  a  para 
phrase  of  the  "Iliad,"  in  which  alpha  or  a  was  rejected 
from  the  first  book,  beta  or  b  from  the  second,  and  so  to 
the  end.  Both  the  Greeks  and  the  Romans  had  their 
karkinie  poems,  or  reciprocal  verses,  so  written  that  the 
line  was  the  same  whether  read  backward  or  forward,  as 
in  the  following: 

"Roma,  tibi,  subito  motibus  ibit  amor." 

Lope  deVega  wrote  five  novels,  the  first  without  an 
A,  the  second  without  a  B,  the  third  without  a  C,  and 
so  on.  At  one  time,  even  long  after  the  revival  of  learn 
ing,  the  grand  merit  of  a  large  part  of  English  and 
Scottish  verse  lay  in  the  ridiculous  conceit  of  all  the 
words  of  a  line  beginning  with  the  same  letter;  at  another 
time,  it  was  a  favorite  device  to  write  Latin  verses  of 
which  every  line  began  with  the  same  syllable  that  had 
concluded  the  preceding  one, —  a  kind  of  game  of  shuttle 
cock,  in  which  one  player  stationed  on  the  left  tossed  a 
line  across  the  page  to  a  second,  who,  passing  with  the 
velocity  of  thought  to  the  same  side,  hurled  another  at  a 
third;  and  thus  the  match  continued  till  he  who  began 
the  sport  put  a  stop  to  it  by  making  his  appearance  on 
the  opposite  list.  In  this  way  the  poor  hapless  poetaster 
was  forced  to  hobble  along  an  avenue,  guarded  on  either 
side  by  a  row  of  unrelenting  monosyllables,  which,  if  his 
mettlesome  fancy  manifested  any  inclination  to  scamper 
according  to  the  freedom  of  her  own  will,  brought  her 
effectually  to  her  senses. 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  241 

But,  of  all  the  ridiculous  shackles  invented  by  the 
devotees  of  these  coxcombical  arts,  the  restrictions  on  the 
shape,  form,  and  length  of  poems,  were  the  most  absurd 
and  ludicrous.  There  are  many  poems  of  the  sixteenth 
century  on  which  a  sort  of  Chinese  ingenuity  seems  to 
have  been  expended;  the  lines  being  so  drawn  in  here, 
and  stretched  out  there, —  so  cut,  twisted,  and  tortured 
in  every  conceivable  way, —  as  to  have  a  rude,  general 
resemblance  to  the  most  fantastical  objects.  Of  course,  it 
was  a  rare  triumph  of  ingenuity  when  an  amatory  poem 
could  be  squeezed  into  the  shape  of  a  heart,  fan,  or  lady's 
gown;  a  still  greater,  perhaps,  when  a  sonnet  on  destiny 
could  be  put  into  the  figure  of  a  pair  of  scissors;  but 
when  an  anacreontic  could  be  coaxed  into  the  form  of  a 
wine-glass,  or  a  meditation  on  mortality  into  the  shape 
of  an  hour-glass  or  tombstone,  the  effect  was  absolutely 
overwhelming.  One  Benlowes,  a  wit  who,  though  now 
forgotten,  is  said  to  have  been  "  excellently  learned  in  his 
day,"  had  a  wonderful  facility  in  this  kind  of  literary 
carpentry.  Butler,  the  author  of  "  Hudibras,"  thus  iron 
ically  commends  him  in  his  "Character  of  a  Small  Poet": 
"There  is  no  feat  of  activity,  nor  gambol  of  wit,  that 
ever  was  performed  by  man,  from  him  that  vaults  on 
Pegasus  to  him  that  tumbles  through  the  hoop  of  an 
epigram,  but  Benlowes  has  got  the  mastery  of  it,  whether 
it  be  high-rope  wit  or  low-rope  wit.  As  for  altars  and 
pyramids  in  poetry,  he  has  outdone  all  men  in  that  way; 
for  he  has  made  a  gridiron  and  a  frying-pan  in  verse, 
that,  besides  the  likeness  in  shape,  the  very  tone  and 
sound  of  the  words  did  perfectly  represent  the  noise 
made  by  these  utensils,  such  as  Sartago  loquendi." 

Another  excruciating  exercise  of  wit,  which  was  in 
11 


242  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

vogue  in  the  sixteenth  century,  especially  with  those 
who  could  not  aspire  to  the  lofty  art  of  shaped-verse- 
making,  was  the  framing  of  anagrams.  By  the  ancients, 
anagram-making,  or  the  transposing  of  the  letters  of 
certain  words  so  as  to  produce  new  words,  was  classed 
among  the  cabalistic  sciences;  and  it  was  often  thought 
that  the  qualities  of  a  man's  mind,  and  his  future  des 
tiny,  could  be  guessed  at  by  anagrammatizing  the  letters 
of  his  name.  When  this  could  be  done  in  such  a 
way  as  to  bring  forth  a  word  or  sentence  pointedly 
allusive  to  the  original  idea,  it  was  deemed  a  mar 
vellous  feat,  and  the  happy  wit  was  ready  to  scream 
with  joy.  In  France,  such  weight  was  attached  to  this 
jugglery  with  letters,  that  Louis  XIII  pensioned  a  pro 
fessional  transposer  of  words.  Occasionally  a  name  would 
appear  to  defy  all  attempts  to  torture  it  into  meaning- 
and  the  pains  and  throes  of  the  anagrammatist,  while  in 
labor,  were  sometimes  terrible  to  behold.  The  venerable 
Camden  speaks  of  the  difficulty  as  "  a  whetstone  of  patience 
to  them  that  shall  try  the  art.  For  some  have  beene  scene 
to  bite  their  pen,  scratch  their  head,  bend  their  browes,  bite 
their  lips,  beate  the  boord,  teare  their  paper,  when  they 
were  faire  for  somewhat,  and  caught  nothing  therein." 
Addison  gives  a  most  ludicrous  account  of  one  of  these 
word-torturers,  who,  after  shutting  himself  up  for  half  a 
year,  and  having  taken  certain  liberties  with  the  name  of 
his  mistress,  discovered,  on  presenting  his  anagram,  that 
he  had  misspelled  her  surname!  by  which  misfortune  he 
was  so  thunderstruck  that  he  shortly  after  lost  his  senses. 
If  ever  an  explosion  of  wrath  were  justifiable,  and  one 
might  be  excused  for  losing  all  self-command,  and  crying 
out  with  Hamlet, 


LITERARY    TRIFLERS.  243 

"—Ay,  turn  thy  complexion  there, 
Patience,  thou  young  and  rose-lipped  cherubin,' 

it  must  be  in  a  case  like  that. 

Almost  as  unhappy  as  this  was  the  experience  of  Daniel 
Dove,  who,  after  long  brooding  over  his  own  name,  was 
able  to  hatch  from  it  the  ominous  presage,  "  leaden  void." 
Knowing  that,  with  a  change  of  one  letter,  he  might  have 
become  "  Ovid,"  he  felt  like  the  man  whose  lottery-ticket 
was  next  in  number  to  the  £20,000  prize.  Sometimes 
from  the  same  name  may  be  extracted  both  good  and  evil 
omens,  as  in  the  case  of  Eleanor  Davies,  wife  of  the  poet, 
and  the  Cassandra  of  her  age,  who  belonged  to  the  Court 
of  Charles  II.  Having  extracted  the  quintessence  of  her 
own  name,  and  finding  in  it  the  impure  anagram, 
"Reveal,  0  Daniel!"  she  began  to  croak  prophecies  by 
no  means  agreeable  to  the  Government,  when  she  was 
silenced  by  an  arrow  drawn  from  her  own  quiver.  She 
was  arraigned  before  the  Court  of  High  Commission,  the 
Judges  of  which  vainly  racked  their  brains  for  arguments 
to  disprove  her  claims  to  inspiration,  when  luckily  it 
occurred  to  one  of  them  to  take  his  pen  and  write  a 
letter  anagram  upon  her  name:  Dame  Eleanor  Davies: 
"Never  so  mad  a  ladie!" — which,  hoisting  the  engineer 
with  his  own  petard,  forever  silenced  the  prophecies. 
The  ingenuity  of  the  Judge  is  only  paralleled  by  that  of 
John  Bunyan,  whose  anagram  on  his  own  name,  "  Nu 
hony  in  a  B,"  is  a  masterly  triumph  over  the  difficulties 
of  orthography. 

"  The  anagram,"  says  Richelet,  "  is  one  of  the  greatest 
follies  of  the  human  mind.  One  must  be  a  fool  to  be 
amused  by  them,  and  worse  than  a  fool  to  make  them." 
Drummond,  of  Hawthornden,  denounces  the  anagram  as 


244  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

"the  most  idle  study  in  the  world  of  learning.  Their 
maker  must  be  homo  miserrimce  patientiae,  and  when  he  is 
done,  what  is  it  but  magno  conatu  nugas  magnas  agere!" 
Happy,  therefore,  he  thought,  was  that  countryman  of  his, 
whose  mistress's  name,  being  Anna  Grame,  contained  a 
ready-made  and  most  acceptable  Anagram.  Considering 
that  not  a  few  men  of  high  repute, —  illustrious  scholars 
and  thinkers  even, —  have  tried  their  hand  at  this  "  ineptie 
de  V esprit  humain"  these  must  be  considered  as  somewhat 
exaggerated  statements.  The  anagram  is  a  triumphant 
answer  to  the  question,  "What's  in  a  name?11  especially 
when  by  a  slight  transposition  a  Wit  is  found  in  WIAT, 
Eenown  in  VERNON,  and  Laurel  in  WALLER.  Though  ana 
grams  are  not  the  grandest  productions  of  human  genius, 
yet  the  intellectual  ingenuity  that  is  sometimes  displayed 
in  resolving  a  word  into  its  elements,  and  from  these  ele 
ments  compounding  some  new  word  characteristic  of  the 
person  or  thing  designated  by  the  original,  is  quite  surpris 
ing.  For  example,  what  can  be  more  curious  than  the 
coincidence  between  Telegraphs  and  its  anagram,  viz.: 
great  helps?  So  of  Astronomers, —  moon-starers;  Peni 
tentiary, — Nay,  I  repent  it-  Eadical  Reform, —  Rare  mad 
frolic.  Hardly  less  felicitous  are  the  following:  Presby 
terian, —  best  in  prayer;  Gallantries, —  all  great  sin;  Old 
England, — golden  land.  Some  years  ago  there  was  an 
eminent  physician  in  London,  whose  name,  John  Aber- 
nethy,  on  account  of  his  bluntness  and  roughness,  was 
metamorphosed  into  "  Johnny  the  Bear."  It  is  probable 
that  even  "  Ursa  Major "  himself  smiled  and  growled  at 
the  same  time  when  he  first  heard  this  witty  anagram. 

Few  persons  will  yield  to  the  logic  of  political   ana 
grams,  but  it  is  impossible  not  to  be  struck  by  the  famous 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  245 

Frantic  Disturbers,  made  from  Francis  Burdett;  and,  in 
an  ignorant  age,  doubtless  not  a  few  persons  were  con 
firmed  in  their  dogged  adherence  to  the  Pretender  to  the 
British  throne,  while  his  enemies  were  startled  and  con 
founded,  by  the  coincidence  of  Charles  James  Stuart  with 
his  anagram,  He  asserts  a  true  claim.  The  two  finest  ana 
grams  ever  made  are:  Honor  est  a  Nilo  (Honor  is  from 
the  Nile),  from  Horatio  Nelson;  and  the  reply  evolved 
from  Pilate's  question,  "Quid  est  veritas?"  (What  is  truth?) 
"Vir  est  qui  adest"  (It  is  the  man  who  stands  before  you.) 
The  following,  written  by  Oldys,  the  bibliographer,  and 
found  By  his  executors  among  his  manuscripts,  will  be 
regarded  by  many  as  "  quaintly  good,"  to  use  an  expres 
sion  of  Isaak  Walton's: 

"  In  word  and  WILL  I  AM  a  friend  to  you, 
And  one  friend  OLD  IS  worth  a  hundred  new." 

The  Greeks  made  few  anagrams,  and  the  Romans  de 
spised  them.  Nearly  all  Latin  anagrams  are  of  modern 
manufacture;  as,  from  corpus  (body)  porcus  (pig),  from 
logica  (logic)  caligo  (darkness).  The  French  have  invented 
a  few  very  happy  anagrams,  of  which  a  remarkably  in 
genious  one  is  that  on  Frere  Jacques  Clement,  the  assassin 
of  Henri  III,  "  C'est  1'enfer  qui  m'a  cree."  What  can  be 
more  beautiful  than  the  anagram  on  the  name  of  Christ, 
in  allusion  to  the  passage  in  Isaiah  liii,  "  He  is  brought  as 
a  sheep  to  the  slaughter"? 


—  Thou  art  that  sheep." 

Rousseau,    ashamed    of    his    father,   who   was    a  cobbler, 

changed  his  name  into  Verniettes,  —  in  which  a  wit  dis 

covered  more  than  the    author  had  dreamed  of,  namely, 


246    '  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

Tu  te  rentes.  Voltaire's  name  is  an  anagram,  derived  from 
his  real  name,  Arouet  l.j.,  or  Arouet  le  jeune.  As  a  speci 
men  of  a  witty  anagram,  there  is  one  on  Charles  Genest, 
a  Frenchman  of  much  note,  which  is,  as  Mrs.  Partington 
would  say,  "a  chief-done-over;1'  it  is  unrivaled.  The  gen 
tleman  in  question  was  distinguished  by  a  preternaturally 
large  organ  of  smell,  such  as  would  have  thrown  Napoleon 
Bonaparte  or  Eden  Warwick  into  raptures  of  admiration, 
—  whereupon  some  ingenious  wag  finds  in  his  name  the 
mirth-provoking  anagram,  "Eh?  c'est  un  grand  nez!" 
(Eh?  it  is  a  great  nose!) 

One  of  the  prettiest  of  modern  anagrams  is  the  follow 
ing: 

'FLORENCE  NIGHTINGALE, 
Flit  on,  charming  angel!  " 

When  the  eloquent  George  Thompson  was  urged  to  go  into 
Parliament  to  serve  the  cause  of  negro  emancipation  more 
efficiently,  one  of  his  friends  found  a  cogent  reason  for 
such  a  course  in  the  letters  of  his  name: 

"GEORGE  THOMPSON, 
0  go  — the.  Negro's  M.  P./" 

A  patriotic  Englishman  made  Napoleon  Bonaparte  read  in 
Latin,  Bona  rapta  leno  pone,  or  "  Rascal,  yield  up  your 
stolen  possessions."  The  last  anagram  we  shall  cite, 
though  less  brilliant  than  the  foregoing,  as  a  mere  feat 
of  intellectual  ingenuity,  is  wonderfully  truthful, — namely, 
editors,  who  are  always  so  tired. 

Another  curious  phase  of  literary  labor  is  alliteration, 
which  may  be  a  mere  trick  or  conceit  of  composition,  or  a 
positive  ornament.  When  used  too  often  it  is  suggestive 
of  laborious  eiforts,  and  affects  the  reader  like  the  feats  of 
an  acrobat,  which  excite  at  last  an  interest  more  painful 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  247 

than  pleasant.  But,  when  used  with  such  subtle  art  as  to 
be  noticed  only  by  the  peculiar  charm  of  sound  that  ac 
companies  it,  it  is  one  of  the  most  delicate  graces  of  lan 
guage.  Spenser  uses  alliteration  often,  and  sometimes 
with  the  finest  effect,  as  in  the  "Shepherd's  Calendar": 

"  But  home  him  hasted  with  furious  heate, 
Encreasing  his  wrathe  with  many  a  threate; 
His  harmeful  hatchet  he  hent  in  hand." 

In  the  following  verse  of  Tennyson,  there  is  an  alliter 
ative  beauty  in  the  pleasant  interlinking  of  the  sounds  of 
d,  and  n,  and  /,  which  is  peculiarly  delicious  to  the  ear, 
because  it  is  so  subtle  as  hardly  to  be  noticed  by  a  common 
reader: 

"Dip  down  upon  the  Northern  shore, 
Oh,  sweet  new  year,  delaying  long; 
Thou  dost  expectant  nature  wrong, 
Delaying  long, —  delay  no  more." 

Shakspeare  has  occasional  instances  of  happy  allitera 
tion,  as  in 

"The  churlish  chiding  of  the  winter's  wind"; 

and  again  in  the  line, 

"In  maiden  meditation,  fancy-free;" 

and  in  the  following  passage  from  "  Macbeth,"  where  the 
grandeur  of  the  effect  is  greatly  increased  by  the  repeti 
tion  of  the  letter  s: 

"That  shall,  to  all  our  nights  and  days  to  come, 
Give  solely  sovereign  sway  and  masterdom." 

The  poet  ridicules,  however,  the  excessive  use  of  this  de 
vice,  as  in  the  prologue  to  the  interlude  of  Pyramus  and 
Thisbe  in  "Midsummer  Night's  Dream": 

"  Whereat  with  blade,  with  bloody  blameful  blade, 
He  bravely  broached  his  boiling  bloody  breast." 


248  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

Alliteration  adds  not  a  little  to  the  force  of  Burns's 
word-painting,  as  when  he  calls  Tarn  O'Shanter 

"A  blethering,  blustering,  drunken  blellum," 

and  characterizes  the  plowman's  collie  as 

"A  rhymin',  rantin',  rovin'  billie." 

Byron  was  a  great  master  of  alliteration.  It  was  a 
favorite  device  of  his,  and  his  finest  passages,  whether 
grave  or  gay,  owe  much  of  their  beauty  and  power  to  it. 
E.g.— 

"  He  who  hath  bent  him  o'er  the  dead, 
Ere  the  first  day  of  death  has  fled, 
The  first  dark  day  of  nothingness, 
The  last  of  danger  and  distress." 

In  the  "Corsair"  he  has  thirty-one  alliterations  in 
twenty-three  lines,  yet  so  skilfully  used  that  the  reader 
is  conscious  of  no  mannerism.  What  an  addition  of  pun 
gency  and  comic  effect  is  given  to  the  epigram  by  this 
expedient,  may  be  seen  by  the  following  lines  from  Byron's 
"English  Bards  and  Scotch  Reviewers1': 

"Yet  mark  one  caution,  ere  thy  next  review 
Spreads  its  light  wings  of  saffron  and  of  blue, 
.Beware  lest  Plundering  .Brough'm  destroy  the  sale, 
Turn  beef  to  Jannocks,  cauliflowers  to  kail ! " 

Coleridge  was  an  adept  in  the  use  of  this  rhyming 
ornament,  as  a  single  example  will  suffice  to  show: 

"The  white  breeze  blew,  the  white  foam  flew, 
The  furrow  followed  free." 

Professor  G.  P.  Marsh  states  that  Milton,  and  the 
classic  school  of  poets  generally,  avoid  alliteration  alto 
gether;  but  this  is  too  sweeping  a  statement,  as,  had 
we  space,  we  might  easily  show.  How  much  the  allitera 
tion  adds  to  the  expressiveness  of  his 

"Behemoth,  biggest  born  of  earth!" 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  249 

and  how  greatly  is  the  force  of  the  following  lines  inten 
sified  by  the  same  device,  where  he  strings  together  his 
vowels  and  consonants  in  juxtaposition,  so  as  to  make 
the  verse  more  harsh  and  grating  to  the  ear: 

"Others  apart  sat  on  a  hill  retired, 
For  thoughts  more  elevate,  and  reasoned  high 
Of  Providence,  foreknowledge,  will  and  fate, 
Fixed  /ate,  /ree  will, /oreknowledge  absolute." 

The  most  brilliant  poets  of  the  day  abound  in  this 
device,  and  even  the  most  accomplished  prose-writers  do 
not  disdain  what  Churchill  calls 

"Apt  alliteration's  artful  aid." 

In  the  following  lines,  by  Austin,  we  have  an  almost 
excessive  use  of  it: 

"  You  knew  Blanche  Barley  ?    Could  we  but  once  more 
.Behold  that  belle  and  pet  of  '54! 
Not  e'en  a  whisper,  vagrant  up  to  Town 
From  hunt  or  race-ball,  augur'd  her  renown. 
far  in  the  wolds  sequester' d  life  she  led, 
.Fair  and  un/ettered  as  the /awn  she/ed, 
(7aress'd  the  calves,  coquetted  with  the  colts, 
.Bestowed  much  tenderness  on  Turkey  polts; 
.Bullied  the  huge,  ungainly  ftloodhound  pup, 
TifTA  with  the  terrier,  coax'd  to  make  it  up: 
The  farmers  quizzed  about  the  ruin'd  crops, 
The  fall  of  barley  and  the  rise  of  hops. 
So  soft  her  tread,  no  nautilus  that  skims 
With  sail  more  silent  than  her  Ziquid  ftmbs. 
Her  presence  was  low  music;  when  she  went 
She  left  behind  a  dreamy  discontent, 
As  sad  as  silence,  when  a  song  is  spent." 

In  irony,  satire,  and  all  kinds  of  comic  writing, 
—  and  even  in  invective, —  alliteration  adds  a  peculiar 
piquancy  to  the  comic  effect.  Thus  Grattan,  denouncing 
the  British  ministry,  said:  "Their  only  means  of  govern 
ment  are  the  guinea  and  the  gallows."  Sydney  Smith 


250  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

employs  this  feature  of  style  with  masterly  skill  and 
effect;  as  when  he  speaks  of  an  opponent  as  "a  polupha- 
gous,  poluposous,  and  pot-bellied  scribbler";  and  when, 
in  contrasting  the  position  of  the  poor  curates  with  that 
of  the  high  dignitaries  of  the  English  Church,  he  calls 
the  two  classes  "the  Rt.  Rev.  Dives  in  the  palace,  and 
Lazarus  in  orders  at  the  gate,  doctored  by  dogs  and 
comforted  with  crumbs."  A  still  more  striking  instance 
is  an  ironical  passage  in  the  "  Letters  of  Peter  Plymley," 
in  which,  ridiculing  a  measure  of  Mr.  Perceval,  the 
British  Premier,  he  asks:  "At  what  period  was  the  plan 
of  conquest  and  constipation  fully  developed?  In  whose 
mind  was  the  idea  of  destroying  the  pride  and  plasters 
of  France  first  engendered?  .  .  .  Depend  upon  it,  the 
absence  of  the  materia  medica  will  soon  bring  them  to 
their  senses,  and  the  cry  of  'Bourbon  and  Bolus!'  burst 
forth  from  the  Baltic  to  the  Mediterranean." 

Proverbs  owe  much  of  their  piquancy  and  point  to 
alliteration,  and  favorite  passages  of  poetry  owe  their 
frequency  of  quotation  not  a  little  to  this  element,  which 
greatly  aids  in  their  recollection.  Two  hundred  years 
ago  John  Norris  wrote  the  line 

"Like  angels'  visits,  short  and  bright," 

which  Blair,  half  a  century  later,  improved  into 

"  Visits,  like  those  of  angels,  short  and  far  between  " ; 

but  Campbell,  unconsciously  appropriating  it,  "  contrived 
at  one  blow  to  destroy  the  beauty  of  the  thought,  and 
yet  to  make  the  verse  immortal  by  giving  it  a  form  that 
soothes  the  ear  and  runs  glibly  off  the  tongue  " : 

"Like  angels'  visits,  few  and  far  between," 

—  a  line  which  is  palpably  tautological. 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  251 

The  following  is  probaoly  the  most  remarkable  speci 
men  of  alliteration  extant.  Any  one  who  has  written  an 
acrostic,  and  who  has  felt  the  embarrassment  of  being 
confined  to  particular  initial  letters,  can  appreciate  the 
ingenuity  demanded  by  these  verses,  where  the  whole 
alphabet  is  fathomed,  and  each  word  in  each  line  exacts 
its  proper  initial.  The  author  must  have  been  "  homo 
miserrimce  patientice  "  : 

"An  Austrian  army,  awfully  arrayed, 
Boldly,  by  battery,  besieged  Belgrade. 
Cossack  commanders  cannonading  come, 
Dealing  destruction's  devastating  doom: 
Every  endeavor  engineers  essay, 
For  fame,  for  fortune  —  fighting  furious  fray: 
Generals  'gainst  generals  grapple  — great  God! 
How  honors  Heaven  heroic  hardihood! 
Infuriate  — indiscriminate  in  ill, 
Kinsmen  kill  kinsmen— kindred  kindred  kill! 
Labor  low  levels  loftiest,  longest  lines  — 
Men  march  'mid  mounds,  'mid  moles,  'mid  murderous  mines. 
New  noisy  numbers  notice  nought 
Of  outward  obstacles,  opposing  ought: 
Poor  patriots,  partly  purchased,  partly  pressed, 
Quite  quaking,  quickly  quarter,  quarter  'quest; 
Reason  returns,  religion's  right  redounds, 
Suwarrow  stops  such  sanguinary  sounds. 
Truce  to  the  Turk  — triumph  to  thy  train! 
Unjust,  unwise,  unmerciful  Ukrane! 
Vanish  vain  victory,  vanish  victory  vain! 
Why  wish  we  warfare,  wherefore  welcome  were 
Xerxes,  Ximenes,  Xanthus,  Xaviere? 
Yield,  ye  youths!  ye  yeomen,  yield  your  yell! 
Zeno's,  Zarpater's,  Zoroaster's  zeal, 
And  all  attracting  — against  arms  appeal." 

Alliteration  occurs  sometimes  in  the  writings  of  the 
ancients,  but  not,  it  is  supposed,  designedly,  as  they  re 
garded  all  echoing  of  sound  as  a  rhetorical  blemish. 
Cicero,  in  the  "  Offices,"  has  this  phrase, —  "  Sensim  sine 


252  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

sensu   setas   senescit";   and  Virgil,   in    the   "./Eneid,"   has 
many  marked  alliterations. 

There  are  several  Latin  poems  of  the  Middle  Ages  in 
alliterative  verse,  the  most  famous  of  which,  the  Pugna 
Porcorum  per  Publium  Porcium  Poetam,  or  "  Battle  of 
the  Pigs,1'  in  which  every  word  begins  with  p,  extends 
to  several  hundred  lines,  thus, — 

u  Propterea  properaus  proconsul,  poplite  prono, 
Precipitem  plebem  pro  patrum  pace  poposcit, 
Persta  paulisper  pubes  preciosa!  precamnr." 

Among  the  literary  devices  which  have  "  fretted  their 
brief  hour  upon  the  stage,  and  now  are  no  more,"  are 
double  rhymes,  in  which  Butler  and  Hood  especially  ex 
celled.  A  still  more  ludicrous  form  of  comic  verse  is 
where  the  rhyme  is  made  by  dividing  the  words,  being 
formed  by  a  similar  sound  in  the  middle  syllables;  as 
in  Canning's  lines;  — 

"  Thou  wast  the  daughter  of  my  Tu- 
tor,  Law  Professor  in  the  U- 
niversity  of  GSttingen; 

or  in  Smith's 

"At  first  I  caught  hold  of  the  wing, 
And  kept  away;  hut  Mr.  Thing- 
umhob,  the  prompter  man, 
Gave  with  his  hand  my  chaise  a  shove, 
And  said,  '  Go  on,  my  pretty  love, 
Speak  to  'em,  little  Nan.'" 

Akin  to  the  waste  of  labor  in  anagrams,  chronograms, 
alliterations,  assonances,  etc.,  though  not  strictly  to  be 
classed  under  literary  trifles,  is  the  waste  of  labor  upon 
microscopic  penmanship.  Years  of  toil  have  been  devoted 
to  copying  in  a  minute  print-hand  books  which  could 
have  been  bought  for  a  trifle  in  ordinary  typography. 
In  the  reign  of  Queen  Elizabeth,  one  Peter  Bales  wrote  a 


LITEKARY   TRIFLERS.  253 

copy  of  the  Bible,  with  the  usual  number  of  pages,  in  a 
hand  so  fine  that  the  whole  could  be  put  into  a  walnut-shell. 
In  St.  John's  College,  Oxford,  there  is  shown  a  portrait  of 
Charles  I,  done  with  the  pen  in  such  a  way  that  the  lines 
are  formed  by  verses  of  the  Psalms,  all  of  which  are 
included  in  the  work.  When  Charles  II  visited  the  Col 
lege,  he  asked  for  it,  with  the  promise  to  grant  any  favor 
in  return;  the  request  was  granted,  and  the  owners  imme 
diately  asked  to  have  the  gift  restored  to  them.  In  the 
British  Museum  there  is  a  portrait  of  Queen  Anne,  on 
which  appear  a  number  of  minute  lines  and  scratches. 
These,  when  examined  through  a  microscope,  are  found  to 
be  the  entire  contents  of  a  small  folio-book  which  belongs 
to  the  library.  Some  years  ago  a  gentleman  in  London 
bought  a  pen-and-ink  portrait  of  Alexander  Pope,  sur 
rounded  by  a  design  in  scroll-work.  Upon  examining  it 
through  a  glass,  to  discover  the  artist's  name,  he  was 
astonished  to  find  that  the  fine  lines  in  the  surrounding 
scroll  were  a  biography  of  the  poet,  so  minutely  transcribed 
as  to  be  legible  only  by  the  aid  of  a  magnifier. 

Another  literary  trifle  upon  which  a  vast  amount  of 
time  and  ingenuity  has  been  expended,  is  the  riddle. 
Riddle-making  has  been  popular  in  all  ages  and  countries, 
and  not  only  the  small  wits,  but  the  big-wigs,  of  Greece, 
Rome,  France,  Germany,  and  England,  have  amused  them 
selves  with  it.  Schiller,  the  German  poet,  was  an  adept  in 
this  art,  and  some  of  his  riddles  are  marvels  of  ingenuity. 
Here  is  one  by  Fox,  the  great  English  orator: 

'•Formed  long  ago,  yet  made  to-day, 

And  most  employed  when  others  sleep; 
What  few  would  wish  to  give  away, 
And  none  would  wish  to  keep." 

The  answer  is  —  a  bed. 


254  LITERARY   TRIFLERS. 

Dr.  Whewell,  the  late  Master  of  Trinity  College,  is 
credited  with  the  following,  which  was  often  on  his  lips. 
It  would  baffle  a  sphynx: 

"U  0  a  0,  but  I  0  thee, 
O  0  no  0,  but  O  0  me; 
Then  let  not  my  0  a  0  go, 
But  give  0010  thee  so." 

"You  sigh  for  a  cypher,  but  I  sigh  for  thee, 
O  sigh  for  no  cypher,  but  O  siuh  for  me; 
Then  let  not  my  sigh  for  a  cypher  go, 
But  give  sigh  for  sigh,  for  I  sigh  for  thee  so." 

Whew — well  done!  we  hear  a  punning  reader  exclaim. 

The  following  is  inferior  to  the  sighing  riddle,  so  often 
repeated  to  his  friends  by  the  author  of  the  "  History  of 
Inductive  Sciences,"  but  it  is  not  the  device  of  a  bungler: 

"Stand  take       to       takings. 
I       you    throw       my " 

"  I  understand 
You  undertake 
To  overthrow 
My  undertakings." 

Prof.  De  Morgan,  author  of  the  celebrated  work  on 
"  The  Theory  of  Probabilities,"  is  the  author  of  a  cunning 
punning  riddle :  How  do  you  know  there  is  no  danger  of 
starving  in  the  desert?  Because  of  the  sand  which  is 
there.  And  how  do  you  know  you  will  get  sandwiches 
there?  Because  Ham  went  into  the  desert,  and  his 
descendants  bred  and  mustered. 

The  following  curious  epitaph  was  found  in  a  foreign 
cathedral : 

"  EPITAPHIUM. 

O  quid  tuae 

be  est  bite; 

ra  ra  ra 

es  et  in 

ram  ram  ram 

i  i." 


LITERARY   TRIFLERS.  255 

These  puzzling  lines  have  been  explained  as  follows: 
Ra,  ra,  ra,  is  thrice  ra,  i.  e.,  ter-ra  —  terra;  ram,  ram,  ram, 
is  thrice  ram,  i.  e.,  ter-ram  —  terram;  i  i  is  twice  i  i,  i.  e., 
i-bis — ibis.  The  first  two  lines  are  to  be  read:  0  super  be, 
quid  super  est  tuse  super  bise.  The  epitaph  will  then  be : 

"O  superbe,  quid  euperest  tuae  superbise? 
Terra  es  et  in  terrain  ibis." 

We   know   not   who    is   the   author   of    the    following 

curious  line: 

"  Sator  arepo  tenet  opera  rotas." 

1.  This  spells  backward  and  forward  the  same.  2.  The 
first  letters  of  all  the  words  spsll  the  first  word.  3.  The 
second  letters  of  all  the  words  spell  the  second  word. 
4.  The  third  letters  of  all  the  words  spell  the  third  word; 
and  so  on  through  the  fourth  and  fifth. 

We  will  close  with  a  specimen  of  the  puzzles  in  letters: 

"CO 
SI" 

"  The  season  is  backward."      (The  C's  on  is  backward.) 

Truly  the  human  mind  is  like  an  elephant's  trunk, — 
capable  of  grasping  the  mightiest  objects,  and  of  adapting 
itself  with  equal  facility  to  the  meanest  and  most  trifling. 
There  is  but  one  thing  to  which  we  can  compare  the  labors 
of  this  whole  tribe  of  triflers, —  it  is  to  the  toils  of  those 
unwearying  imps  who  were  set  by  the  magician  to  the  task 
of  twisting  ropes  out  of  sea-sand. 


AYRITING  FOR  THE  PRESS. 


A  LMOST  every  person  who  is  a  known  contributor  to 
-*--*-  the  press  receives,  more  or  less  often,  letters  like  the 
following:  "I  am  not  earning  enough  to  pay  my  ex 
penses,  and,  to  make  the  two  ends  meet,  I  would  like 
to  write  for  the  press.  Can  you  give  me  some  hints?" 
The  number  of  persons  who,  when  at  their  wits1  ends, 
in  despair  of  eking  out  a  living  in  any  other  way,  look 
to  journalism  as  a  last  resource,  is  legion.  The  passion 
ate  appeals  which  are  made  personally  or  by  letter  to 
the  managing-editor  of  a  leading  journal,  beseeching  him 
to  buy  articles,  nine-tenths  of  which  are  utterly  worth 
less,  and  ninety-nine  hundredths  of  which  could  not  be 
got  into  the  paper,  were  they  ever  so  interesting,  make 
his  place  anything  but  a  bed  of  roses.  Even  in  the  old- 
fashioned  newspaper-establishments,  where  four  or  five 
steep,  dark,  and  dingy  stair-cases  must  be  climbed  to 
reach  the  editorial  den,  some  would-be  contributor,  male 
or  female,  may  be  seen  panting  up  the  steps  almost 
hourly;  but,  in  the  modern  offices,  in  which  the  steam- 
elevator  has  placed  all  the  floors  on  a  level,  the  swarms 
of  writers  that  beset  the  manager,  coaxing,  imploring, 
almost  insisting,  that  their  MSS.  shall  be  used,  render 
his  situation  absolutely  appalling.  To  ninety-nine  out  of 
every  hundred  of  these  persons  he  must  return  an  inex 
orable  No.  No  would-be  contributor,  however,  dreams 
that  he  is  doomed  to  be  one  of  the  ninety-nine;  and  be- 


WRITING   FOR  THE   PRESS.  257 

cause  it  is  useless,  therefore,  to  begin  with  Punch's  advice 
to  those  about  to  marry,  "Don't!"  we  offer  the  following 
suggestions: 

First,  consider  well  whether  you  have  the  peculiar 
qualifications  required  in  a  newspaper-writer.  Writing 
for  the  press  has  grown  to  be  an  art  by  itself;  it  is  one 
whose  rules  and  principles,  like  those  of  music,  sculpture, 
and  painting,  must  be  mastered  by  intense,  patient,  and 
persistent  study  by  those  who  aspire  to  success.  To  write 
a  really  good  editorial  or  contribution  is  like  scaling  an 
Alp,  which,  in  its  clearness  of  atmosphere,  seems  so  near, 
and  yet  is  so  far  a-nd  so  hard  of  ascent. 

It  is  a  great  mistake  to  suppose  that,  because  the 
greater  includes  the  less,  the  talents  which  qualify  a  man 
to  write  a  first-rate  book  will  make  him  a  good  article- 
writer.  Many  an  author  of  reputation,  who  has  reasoned 
thus,  has  started  off  brilliantly  in  the  career  of  journal 
ism;  but,  after  a  little  smart  writing  and  display  of 
bookish  ability,  has  "  fallen  flat  and  shamed  his  worship 
ers,"  because  he  could  not  seize  and  condense  the  spirit 
and  moral  of  passing  history.  As  Carlyle  complains  of 
the  needle-women  of  England,  that  there  are  seamstresses 
few  or  none,  but  botchers  in  abundance,  capable  only  of 
"  a  distracted  puckering  and  botching, —  not  sewing,  only 
a  fallacious  hope  of  it,  a  fond  imagination  of  the  mind"; 
so  in  literary  labor,  especially  journalism,  it  is  but  too 
true  that  there  are  many  botchers,  and  few  skilled  work 
men, —  very  little  good  article-writing,  and  a  deal  of 
"  distracted  puckering  and  botching."  It  is  true  there  is 
no  mystery  in  the  craft  when  we  have  once  learned  it, 
as  there  is  none  in  walking  on  a  tight-rope,  turning  a 
double  back- summersault,  or  vaulting  through  a  hoop 


258  WRITING   FOR  THE   PRESS. 

upon  a  running  horse.  The  difficulty  is, —  to  learn.  It 
may  seem  a  very  easy  thing  to  trim  a  bonnet;  but  hun 
dreds  of  expert  workmen,  who  can  do  things  far  more 
difficult  and  complicated,  fail  utterly  when  they  try  to 
trim  a  bonnet.  A  man  may  be  a  brilliant  review  or 
magazine  writer,  and  yet  not  show  a  particle  of  skill  or 
tact  in  conducting  a  daily  or  weekly  newspaper.  It  is 
one  thing  to  elaborate  an  article  at  leisure,  "  with  malice 
prepense  and  aforethought,"  in  one's  study,  hedged  in  by 
books  on  every  side,  with  other  "  appliances  and  means 
to  boot";  and  quite  another  to  cope  with  the  hydrostatic 
pressure,  the  prompt  selection  of  salient  points,  and  the 
rapid,  glancing  treatment  of  them,  demanded  by  a  daily 
journal. 

Which,  indeed,  are  the  most  popular  papers  of  the 
day?  Is  it  the  journals  that  are  filled  mainly  with  long 
and  ponderous  disquisitions  that  smell  of  the  lamp;  arti 
cles  crammed  with  statistics,  and  useful  knowledge  of 
the  "  penny- magazine  "  stamp,  which  it  is  more  painful 
to  read  than  it  was  to  write  them?  No;  they  are,  almost 
without  exception,  those  whose  merit  lies  in  condensation; 
which,  with  full  reports  of  news,  and  a  limited  number 
of  elaborate  discussions,  give  the  apices  rerum,  the  cream 
and  quintessence  of  things;  whose  pithy  paragraphs, 
squeezed  into  the  smallest  possible  space,  may  be  taken 
in  by  the  eye  while  the  reader  is  occupied  in  discussing 
a  cup  of  coffee,  or  devoured  like  a  sandwich  between  two 
mouthfuls  of  bread  and  butter.  These  are  the  papers 
which  are  sought  for  with  avidity,  and  devoured  with 
keen  relish;  which  are  passed  from  hand  to  hand,  and 
read  till  they  are  worn  out;  and  to  serve  up  the  spicy 
repast  they  furnish,  is  a  Sisyphan  task,  which  requires 


WRITING    FOR  THE    PEESS.  259 

ceaseless  industry  and  a  peculiar  combination  of  talents 
which  not  one  educated  man  in  a  thousand  possesses. 

It  is  the  lack  of  these  talents  and  the  neglect  of  these 
principles  which  explain  the  failure  of  so  many  newspa 
pers  and  newspaper-writers.  The  rock  on  which  they 
split  is  ignorance  or  forgetfulness  of  the  very  end  of  a 
newspaper.  The  first  thought  which  should  be  uppermost 
in  the  mind  of  every  writer  for  the  press  is  that  this 
"  map  of  busy  life  "  is  a  thing  not  to  be  read  or  studied, 
but  to  be  glanced  over.  The  contents  must  be  such  as 
at  once  to  catch  the  attention.  Take  care,  then,  at  the 
beginning,  not  to  frighten  the  reader  by  a  long  article. 
Big  guns  make  a  loud  noise,  but  rifle-balls  often  do  the 
greatest  execution.  A  tremendous  thought  may  be  packed 
into  a  small  compass,  made  as  solid  as  a  cannon-ball,  and 
cut  down  everything  before  it.  "  A  brief  ejaculation," 
says  South,  "may  be  a  big  and  a  mighty  prayer";  and 
a  ten-line  paragraph, —  a  single  thought,  pungently  pre 
sented, —  may  change  a  man's  convictions  in  politics  or 
religion,  or  be  a  seed-corn  to  fructify  through  his  whole 
life.  An  ideal  newspaper  article  is  not  an  exhaustive 
essay,  but  a  brief  monogram,  for  which  one  positive  and 
central  idea  is  sufficient.  As  Virgil  says  of  farms:  "Ad 
mire  long  articles;  cultivate  short  ones." 

To  achieve  this,  make  sure  that  you  have  something 
to  say,  and  say  it  only  when  you  are  in  the  vein, —  in 
your  best  mood.  Are  you  a  clergyman?  Don't  write  on 
"blue  Monday,"  when  you  feel  like  a  mouse  in  an 
exhausted  receiver.  Why  rush  before  fifty  thousand 
readers  when  you  feel  so  stupid  that  you  can't  prepare  a 
sermon  for  five  hundred  hearers?  Waste  no  time  on 
introductions.  Don't  begin  by  laying  out  your  subject 


260  WRITING   FOE  THE   PRESS. 

like  a  Dutch  flower-garden,  or  telling  your  motives  for 
writing.  Nobody  cares  how  you  came  to  think  of  your 
theme,  or  why  you  write  upon  it.  Sink  rhetoric,  and 
throw  Blair  and  Campbell  to  the  winds.  Copy  Milton, 
who  does  not  stop  to  invoke  his  Muse  till  he  has  first 
announced  his  theme,  "  of  man's  first  disobedience  and 
the  fall."  Plunge  at  once  into  the  very  middle  of  your 
subject,  and  "pluck  out  the  heart  of  its  mystery.1'  The 
first  end  is  to  excite  attention.  The  keynote  should  be 
struck,  if  possible,  in  the  very  first  sentence.  A  dull 
beginning  often  damns  an  article;  a  spicy  one,  that  whets 
the  appetite  by  a  prime,  juicy  slice  right  out  of  the  middle 
of  the  coming  joint,  often  commends  an  article  to  both 
editor  and  reader.  Be  brief  and  crisp,  giving  results 
only,  not  processes, —  suggesting  argument  rather  than 
stating  it.  Don't  serve  up  with  the  pearl  the  oyster  and 
the  shell. 

Put  your  points  clearly  and  sharply;  don't  cover  them 
up  with  verbiage,  but  let  them  stick  out.  Macaulay  well 
says  that  a  bold,  dashing,  scene-painting  manner  is  that 
which  always  succeeds  best  in  periodical  writing.  Let 
your  sentences  be  electrically  charged.  Let  every  word 
leap  with  life,  and  blot  out  every  one  which  does  not 
help  to  clench  the  meaning.  Condense, —  condense, —  con 
dense.  Ignore  all  inferences,  and  regard  explanatory 
sentences  as  a  nuisance.  Some  writers  always  explain  a 
thing  to  death.  Throw  subordinate  thoughts  to  the  dogs 
Thin  your  fruit  that  the  tree  may  not  be  exhausted,  and 
that  some  of  it  may  come  to  perfection.  Above  all,  stop 
when  you  are  done.  Don't  let  the  ghost  of  your  thought 
wander  about  after  the  death  of  the  body.  Aim  to  be 
suggestive,  not  exhaustive,  and  leave  the  reader  to  draw 


WRITING   FOR   THE    PRESS.  261 

many  inferences  for  himself.  Take  for  granted,  after  all 
your  condensation,  that  your  article  is  twice  too  long. 
Leave  off  the  beginning  and  the  conclusion,  and  make  the 
middle  as  short  as  possible.  Cutting  it  down  may  require 
nerve,  but  it  is  the  compactness  which  makes  it  do 
execution.  Lastly,  lay  aside  your  paper,  if  possible,  for 
a  week,  and  then  retouch  it;  strengthen  its  weak  points, 
and  polish  its  rough  ones.  Too  many  article- writers 
grudge  the  toil  which  is  necessary  to  perfect  their  con 
tributions.  They  quote  Taine,  who  condemns  transitions, 
elegances  of  style,  "  the  whole  literary  wardrobe,"  to  the 
old-clothes  shop.  "  The  age  demands  ideas,  not  arrange 
ment  of  ideas;  the  pigeon-holes  are  manufactured;  fill 
them."  True,  in  a  certain  sense;  but  ideas,  like  soldiers, 
owe  their  force  largely  to  their  arrangement.  Thoughts 
become  different  thoughts  when  expressed  in  different 
language.  Other  newspaper-writers  believe  in  fast  writ 
ing,  which  is  generally  apt  to  be  hard  reading.  The 
thought,  they  say,  should  be  struck  off  in  the  passion  of 
the  moment;  the  sword-blade  must  go  red-hot  to  the 
anvil,  and  be  forged  in  a  few  seconds,  not  by  piecemeal, 
if  you  would  have  it  of  heavenly  temper.  Granted;  but, 
after  the  forging,  long  and  weary  polishing  and  grinding 
must  follow  before  your  sword-blade  will  cut.  What 
would  you  think  of  a  cutler  who  should  say,  "  I  turn 
out  knives  with  great  facility,  but  I  cannot  stop  to  give 
them  an  edge?1'  Cassius  Etruscius  boasted  that  he  could 
write  two  hundred  pages  before  dinner,  and  as  many 
after.  He  was  burned,  as  he  deserved  to  be,  on  a  pile 
of  his  own  productions. 

We  have  said  nothing  of  the   mechanical  parts  of  an 
article.      That  it  should   be  written   legibly,  on  one  side 


262  WRITING   FOB    THE   PRESS. 

of  small-sized  sheets,  with  careful  punctuation  and  spell 
ing,  and  plenty  of  paragraphs,  is  generally  known.  We 
might  add  other  useful  hints;  but  enough.  Follow  the 
directions  we  have  given,  and,  if  you  have  a  soul  that 
fires  with  great  thoughts,  and  fears  not  to  utter  them 
freely,  you  may  wield  with  the  pen  a  power  that  no 
sceptre  can  rival.  But,  if  you  have  no  enthusiasm  or 
inspiration,  and  can't  put  fire  into  your  writings,  you 
would  better  put  your  writings  into  the  fire.  If  you  don't 
do  so,  and  your  article  goes  to  "  Balaam's  box,"  don't  fly 
into  a  passion  and  call  the  editor  a  fool,  or  assert  that 
he  is  prejudiced.  Mothers  are  always  partial  to  their 
deformed  children,  and  authors  think  most  highly  of  their 
rickety  literary  bantlings.  Don't  waste  a  moment's  time 
in  vindicating  your  productions  against  editors  or  critics, 
but  expend  your  energies  in  writing  something  which  shall 
be  its  own  vindication. 

Finally,  do  you  feel,  on  reading  these  hints,  as  did 
Easselas  when  he  had  listened  to  the  detail  of  the  quali 
fications  necessary  to  a  poet,  and  exclaimed:  "  Who,  then, 
can  be  a  poet?"  We  confess  it  is  the  picture  of  an  ideal 
article- writer  that  we  have  drawn;  but,  though  the  con 
ception  that  haunts  our  brain  is  one  which  we  have  been 
utterly  unable  to  realize, —  though  our  ideal,  after  many 
weary  years'  pursuit,  still  flies  before  us  like  the  horizon, 
and  mocks  us  with  its  unattainable  charm, —  we  still  have 
the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that  our  readers  yawn  less 
frequently  than  if  we  had  adopted  a  lower  and  more 
easily- reached  standard. 


STUDY  OF  THE  MODERN  LANGUAGES. 


rr^HAT  the  study  of  foreign  languages  is  a  necessary 
**-  part  of  a  liberal  education  is  a  proposition  which  few 
intelligent  persons  will  at  this  day  dispute.  The  records 
of  thought  and  knowledge  are  many  tongued;  and,  there 
fore,  as  a  means  of  encyclopaedic  culture, —  of  that  thorough 
intellectual  equipment  which  is  so  imperiously  demanded 
of  every  scholar,  and  even  thinker,  at  the  present  day, —  a 
knowledge  of  foreign  literature,  both  ancient  and  modern, 
is  absolutely  indispensable. 

Familiarity  with  foreign  languages  liberalizes  the  mind 
in  the  same  way  as  foreign  travel.  The  Emperor  Charles  V 
once  said  that  to  learn  a  new  language  was  to  acquire  a 
new  soul.  The  man  who  is  familiar  only  with  the  writers 
of  his  native  tongue  is  in  danger  of  confounding  what  is 
accidental  with  what  is  essential,  and  of  supposing  that 
manners  and  customs,  tastes  and  habits  of  thought,  which 
belong  only  to  his  own  age  and  country,  are  inseparable 
from  the  nature  of  man.  Acquainting  himself  with  foreign 
literatures,  he  finds  that  opinions  which  he  had  thought  to 
be  universal,  and  feelings  which  he  had  supposed  in 
stinctive,  have  been  unknown  to  millions.  He  thus  loses 
that  Chinese  cast  of  mind,  that  contempt  for  everything 
outside  of  his  own  narrow  circle,  which  was  a  foe  to  all 
self-knowledge  and  to  all  self-improvement.  He  doubts 
where  he  formerly  dogmatized ;  he  tolerates  where  he 
formerly  execrated.  Qualifying  the  sentiments  of  the 


264  STUDY   OF  THE   MODERN   LANGUAGES. 

writers  of  his  own  age  and  country  with  the  thoughts  and 
sentiments  of  writers  in  other  ages  and  other  countries,  he 
ceases  to  bow  slavishly  to  the  authority  of  those  who 
breathe  the  same  atmosphere  with  himself,  and  with  whose 
idiosyncrasies  he  is  en  rapport.  He  declines  henceforth  to 
accept  their  opinions,  to  make  their  tastes  his  tastes,  and 
their  prejudices  his  prejudices,  and  thus  avoids  that  mental 
slavery  which  is  baser  than  the  slavery  of  the  body. 

While  we  thus  appreciate  the  value  "of  linguistic  studies 
to  the  few  who  have  the  time  and  money  for  thorough 
culture,  we  yet  doubt  whether  the  study  of  foreign  lan 
guages,  to  the  extent  that  fashion  now  exacts,  is  wise  or 
profitable.  That  an  Englishman,  Frenchman,  or  German, 
even  though  a  business  man,  should  deem  a  knowledge  of 
them  not  only  useful,  but  even  vital  to  his  worldly  success, 
we  can  understand.  There  is  hardly  a  commercial  house 
of  any  note  in  England  that  does  not  sell  goods  to  Ger 
many,  France,  Switzerland,  Sweden,  or  Russia;  hence  every 
such  house  must  have  employes  to  conduct  its  foreign  corre 
spondence,  and  a  knowledge  of  foreign  tongues  is,  therefore, 
one  of  the  best  recommendations  with  which  a  young  man 
seeking  a  clerkship  can  be  armed.  The  same  is  true  of 
Germany  and  France;  but  who  will  pretend  that  such  is 
the  fact  in  this  country?  If,  instead  of  all  speaking  a 
common  tongue,  the  Eastern,  Northern,  Southern,  Western, 
and  Middle  States  of  our  country  spoke  as  many  languages, 
the  lingual  necessities  of  our  merchants  and  manufacturers 
would  be  similar  to  those  of  the  great  business  houses  of 
Europe;  but,  as  the  facts  are,  no  such  necessities  exist.  It 
is  true  we  have  a  few  houses  that  do  business  with  Europe; 
and  it  is  true,  also,  that  in  a  few  of  our  largest  cities, 
there  are  many  foreigners  who  cannot  speak  English ;  but; 


STUDY   OF  THE  MODERN    LANGUAGES.  265 

everywhere  else,  linguistic  knowledge  is  of  little  prac 
tical  use. 

The  question  is  not  whether  a  knowledge  of  French  and 
German  is  desirable  per  se,  but  whether  it  is  not  too  dearly 
purchased.  Is  it  worth  the  heavy  tax  which  our  youth  pay 
for  it?  Cannot  the  weary  days,  weeks,  months,  and  even 
years,  which  are  spent  in  acquiring  what,  after  all,  is 
usually  but  the  merest  smattering  of  those  tongues,  be 
more  profitably  spent  upon  English  literature  and  the 
sciences?  There  is  hardly  any  subject  upon  which  so  much 
illusion  prevails  as  upon  the  supposed  ease  with  which  a 
modern  language  can  be  mastered.  We  hear  it  daily 
remarked  that  French  and  Italian  are  very  easy,  and  that 
German,  though  presenting  some  difficulties,  is  by  no  means 
hard  to  acquire.  Now  the  truth,  to  which,  sooner  or  later, 
every  student  is  forced  to  open  his  eyes,  is,  that  the  acquisi 
tion  of  any  language,  as  Mr.  Lincoln  said  of  the  crushing 
of  the  Rebellion,  is  "  a  big  job."  The  mastering  of  a 
foreign  tongue,  even  the  easiest,  is  the  work,  not  of  a  day, 
but  of  years,  and  years  of  stern,  unremitting  toil. 

It  is  true  that  Mr.  Macaulay  undertook  (we  know  not 
with  what  success)  to  possess  himself  of  the  German  lan 
guage  during  a  four  months1  voyage  from  India  to  Europe; 
but  have  we  not  the  authority  of  the  same  Mr.  Macaulay 
for  the  statement  that  Frederick  the  Great,  after  reading, 
speaking,  writing  French,  and  nothing  but  French,  during 
more  than  half  a  century, —  after  unlearning  his  mother 
tongue  in  order  to  learn  French, —  after  living  familiarly 
many  years  with  French  associates, —  could  not,  to  the  last, 
compose  in  French,  without  imminent  risk  of  committing 
some  mistake  which  would  have  moved  a  smile  in  ths 
literary  circles  of  Paris?  Mr.  Hamerton,  the  author  of 
12 


266  STUDY   OF   THE   MODERN   LANGUAGES. 

"The  Intellectual  Life," — a  most  competent  judge, —  lays 
down  the  following  two  propositions,  tested  by  a  large 
experience,  as  unassailable  :  1.  Whenever  a  foreign  lan 
guage  is  perfectly  acquired,  there  are  peculiar  family 
conditions.  The  person  has  either  married  a  person  of  the 
other  nation,  or  is  of  mixed  blood.  2.  A  language  cannot 
be  learned  by  an  adult  without  five  years'  residence  in  the 
country  where  it  is  spoken;  and,  without  habits  of  close 
observation,  a  residence  of  twenty  years  is  insufficient. 
Mr.  Hamerton  further  adds  that  one  of  the  most  accom 
plished  of  English  linguists  remarked  to  him  that,  after 
much  observation  of  the  labors  of  others,  he  had  come  to 
the  rather  discouraging  conclusion  that  it  was  not  possible 
to  learn  a  foreign  language. 

This  is  an  extreme  position;  but,  if  by  "learning  a  lan 
guage  "  is  meant  a  thorough  acquisition  of  it,  so  that  one 
can  speak  and  write  it  like  a  native,  we  believe  that  the 
statement  is  impregnable.  Of  course,  we  except  the  few 
prodigies  of  linguistic  genius, —  the  Magliabecchis  and  the 
Mezzofantes,  of  whom  but  one  appears  in  a  century, —  men 
who,  as  De  Quincey  says,  in  the  act  of  dying,  commit  a  rob 
bery,  absconding  with  a  valuable  polyglot  dictionary. 

Will  it  be  said  in  reply,  that  a  knowledge  of  a  foreign 
language  may  fall  short  of  perfection,  yet  be  of  great  prac 
tical  and  even  educational  value?  We  admit  it;  we  admit 
that  there  are  men  who  learn  many  languages  sufficiently 
for  certain  practical  purposes,  and  yet  never  thoroughly 
master  the  grammar  of  one.  Such  a  man  was  Goethe. 
Easily  excited  to  throw  his  energy  in  a  new  direction,  as 
his  biographer  tells  us,  he  had  not  the  patience  which 
begins  at  the  beginning,  and  rises  gradually,  slowly,  into 
assured  mastery.  Like  an  eagle,  he  swooped  down  upon 


STUDY   OF  THE   MODERN   LANGUAGES.  267 

his  prey;  he  could  not  watch  for  it  with  cat-like  patience. 
But  though  Goethe  had  no  critical  knowledge  of  foreign 
languages, —  was  but  an  indifferent  linguist, —  he  had  what 
was  better  for  his  own  purposes,  the  divining  instinct  of 
genius,  which  enabled  him  to  seize  upon  and  appropriate 
the  spirit  of  compositions,  to  a  knowledge  of  which  other 
men  attain  only  by  a  critical  study  of  the  letter.  But 
Goethe's  method  is  one  that  can  be  safely  followed  only  by 
those  who  have  Goethe's  genius.  For  the  mass  of  students 
there  is  no  royal  road,  no  safe  short-cut,  to  a  language. 
The  Duke  of  Wellington,  when  asked  how  he  spoke  French, 
replied,  "  With  the  greatest  intrepidity;"  and  so  he  fought 
at  Waterloo ;  but  it  was  not  till,  after  years  of  patient  toil, 
he  had  mastered  the  art  of  war.  Intrepidity  is  an  indis 
pensable  thing;  but  it  is  not  reasonable,  if  possible,  till 
after  one  has  conquered  all  the  difficulties  of  the  idiom.  A 
mastery  far  short  of  this,  may  be  very  serviceable;  but  we 
do  not  believe  that  the  smattering  which  the  great  major 
ity  of  our  young  men  and  women  get, —  and  ivhich  is  all 
they  can  get  in  most  cases, —  can  possibly  enrich  them  intel 
lectually. 

As  Mr.  Hamerton  justly  urges,  until  you  can  really 
feel  the  refinements  of  a  language,  you  can  get  little  help 
or  furtherance  from  it  of  any  kind, —  nothing  but  an  inter 
minable  series  of  misunderstandings.  "  True  culture  ought 
to  strengthen  the  faculty  of  thinking,  and  to  provide  the 
material  upon  which  that  noble  faculty  may  operate.  An 
accomplishment  which  does  neither  of  these  two  things  for 
us  is  useless  for  our  culture,  though  it  may  be  of  consider 
able  practical  convenience  in  the  affairs  of  ordinary  life." 
In  the  weighty  words  of  Milton:  "Though  a  man  should 
pride  himself  to  have  all  the  tongues  that  Babel  cleft  the 


268  STUDY   OF  THE   MODERN   LANGUAGES. 

world  into,  yet  if  he  have  not  studied  the  solid  things  in 
them,  he  were  nothing  so  much  to  be  esteemed  a  learned 
man,  as  any  yeoman  or  tradesman  competently  wise  in  his 
mother  dialect  only." 

He  is  a  poor  economist  who  looks  only  at  the  value  of 
an  acquisition  without  counting  the  cost.  If  a  young 
man  can  begin  his  studies  early  and  continue  them  till 
his  twenty-first  year,  by  all  means  let  him  study  French 
and  German.  But  in  no  case  would  we  have  him  study 
those  tongues  at  the  expense  of  utter  ignorance  or  the 
merest  surface-knowledge  of  his  own  language  and  its 
literature,  and  of  the  physical  sciences.  That  the  two 
latter  branches  of  knowledge  are  far  more  essential  than 
the  former  to  both  his  success  and  happiness,  we  cannot 
doubt.  Unfortunately,  the  majority  of  our  young  men 
are  compelled  to  plunge  into  business  so  early  that  they 
are  forced  to  elect  between  the  two  acquisitions;  they 
cannot  have  both.  For  such  persons  to  choose  the  French 
and  German,  and  neglect  the  sciences  and  their  own  noble 
tongue  and  its  literature,  is  as  absurd  as  it  would  be  for 
a  laborer  to  stint  himself  all  the  year  in  meat  or  bread 
that  he  may  enjoy  a  few  baskets  of  strawberries  in  April. 
We  yield  to  no  one  in  our  admiration  of  Montaigne,  Pascal, 
Moliere,  Cuvier,  and  Sainte-Beuve,  or  of  Goethe,  Schiller, 
Lessing,  Richter,  and  Heine ;  but  we  do,  nevertheless,  echo 
most  heartily  the  words  of  Thomas  DeQuincey, — himself 
a  consummate  linguist, —  when  he  declares  that  it  is  a 
pitiable  spectacle  to  see  young  persons  neglecting  the 
golden  treasures  of  their  own  literature,  and  wasting  their 
time  on  German,  French  and  Italian  authors,  comparatively 
obscure,  and  immeasurably  inferior  in  quality.  (See  p.  22.) 

The  same  writer  has  admirably  explained  the  secret  of 


STUDY    OF   THE   MODERN"   LAlSTGUAliES.  269 

this  strange  preference, —  a  preference  with  which  fashion 
has  doubtless  as  much  to  do  as  the  cause  he  names:  "It  is 
the  habit  (well  known  to  psychologists)  of  transferring  to 
anything  created  by  our  own  skill,  or  which  reflects  our 
own  skill,  as  if  it  lay  causatively  and  objectively  in  the 
thing  itself,  that  pleasurable  power  which  in  very  truth 
belongs  subjectively  to  the  inind  of  him  who  surveys  it, 
from  conscious  success  in  the  exercise  of  his  own  energies. 
Hence  it  is  that  we  see  daily  without  surprise  young 
ladies  hanging  enamored  over  the  pages  of  an  Italian 
author,  and  calling  attention  to  trivial  commonplaces,  such 
as,  clothed  in  plain  mother  English,  would  have  been  more 
repulsive  to  them  than  the  distinctions  of  a  theologian  or 
the  counsels  of  a  great-grandmother.  They  mistake  for  a 
pleasure  yielded  by  the  author  what  is  in  fact  the  pleasure 
attending  their  own  success  in  mastering  what  was  lately 
an  insuperable  difficulty." 

We  are  fully  convinced  that  even  the  literary  man, 
though  he  cannot  dispense  with  a  familiarity  with  the 
modern  languages,  pays  a  high  price  for  his  knowledge. 
Here,  as  everywhere  else,  the  law  of  compensation  holds. 
Familiarity  with  foreign  idioms  almost  invariably  injures 
an  author's  style.  We  know  that  the  Romans,  in  exact 
proportion  to  their  study  of  Greek,  paralyzed  some  of 
the  finest  powers  of  their  own  language.  Schiller  tells  us 
that  he  was  in  the  habit  of  reading  as  little  as  possible  in 
foreign  tongues,  because  it  was  his  business  to  write  Ger 
man,  and  he  thought  that,  by  reading  other  languages,  he 
should  lose  his  nicer  perceptions  of  what  belonged  to  his 
own.  Thomas  Moore,  who  was  a  fine  classical  scholar,  tells 
us  that  the  perfect  purity  with  which  the  Greeks  wrote 
their  own  language  was  justly  attributed  to  their  entire 


270  STUDY   OF  THE   MODERN    LANGUAGES. 

abstinence  from  any  other.  It  is  notorious  that  Burke, 
after  he  took  to  reading  the  pamphlets  of  the  French 
terrorists,  never  wrote  so  pure  English  as  he  did  before. 
Gibbon,  who  boasted  that  his  Essai  sur  VEtude  de  la 
Literature  was  taken  by  the  Parisians  for  the  production 
of  one  of  their  own  countrymen,  paid  for  the  idiomatic 
purity  of  his  French  by  the  Gallicisms  that  aeform  the 
"Decline  and  Fall.'1 

Our  young  men  might  be  pardoned  for  making  some 
sacrifices  to  acquire  a  knowledge  of  the  modern  languages, 
if  such  a  knowledge  were  necessary  as  a  key  to  their 
literatures;  but  it  is  not.  Nearly  all  the  masterpieces 
have  been  translated  into  English.  We  are  aware  of  the 
objections  to  translations;  they  are,  at  best,  as  Cervantes 
said,  but  "  the  reverse  side  of  tapestry."  The  scholar  has 
yet  to  be  born  who  can  reproduce  in  their  full  splendor  in 
another  tongue  the  epithets  of  St.  Paul,  the  silvery  lights 
of  Livy,  the  curiosa  felicitas  of  Horace,  or  the  picture- 
words  of  ^Eschylus.  But  how  many  of  our  young  men 
and  women,  who  cannot  give  themselves  a  liberal  edu 
cation,  are  likely  to  enjoy  the  originals  better  than  the 
translations  that  are  executed  by  accomplished  linguists? 
Not  one  in  fifty.  If  a  man  of  so  exquisite  a  taste  as 
Mr.  Emerson  prefers,  as  he  tells  us,  to  read  foreign  works 
in  translations,  is  it  at  all  likely  that  "  Young  America," 
with  his  almost  utter  ignorance  of  the  niceties  and  deli 
cacies  of  the  modern  languages,  will  lose  much  by  imitating 
his  example?  We  say,  then,  in  conclusion,  if  you  are  a 
man  of  leisure,  or  have  sufficient  time  and  money  for  a  lib 
eral  education,  by  all  means  study  French  and  German,  and, 
if  you  can,  Spanish  and  Italian;  but,  if  you  are  to  begin 
life  at  eighteen  or  twenty,  let  Spiers  and  Adler  alone. 


STUDY   OF  THE   MODERN    LANGUAGES.  271 

Your  first  duty  is  to  acquaint  yourself  with  the  learn 
ing  and  literature  of  your  own  and  the  mother  country. 
Our  English  granaries  will,  of  themselves,  •  feed  a  long 
life.  When  you  have  mastered  the  giants  who  wrote  in 
your  mother-tongue, —  when  the  great  works  of  Chaucer, 
Shakspeare,  Hooker,  Bacon,  Milton,  Swift,  Wordsworth, 
Byron,  Mill,  Tennyson,  and  all  our  other  representative 
authors,  have  passed  like  the  iron  atoms  of  the  blood  into 
your  mental  constitution,  it  will  be  time  to  go  abroad 
after  "  fresh  fields  and  pastures  new."  But  do  not,  we 
beg  of  you,  indulge  the  foolish  ambition  of  becoming  a 
polyglot  when  you  cannot  write  a  grammatical  letter  in 
your  mother-tongue,  and  have  never  read  a  page  in  half 
of  its  best  writers. 


WORKING  BY  RULE. 


A  BOSTON  correspondent  of  the  New  York  "  Tribune," 
-£-*-  in  speaking  of  the  late  Professor  Agassiz,  remarks 
that  he  was  singularly  unmethodical  in  his  habits.  Men 
who  live  and  work  by  rule  would  be  puzzled  to  under 
stand  how  the  great  scientist  contrived  to  do  sa  much 
without  these  helps.  Agassiz  lived  and  worked  by  in 
spiration.  "If  he  was  suddenly  seized  with  an  interest 
in  some  scientific  inquiry,  he  would  pursue  it  at  once, — 
putting  by,  perhaps,  other  work  in  which  he  had  just 
got  f?'»ly  started.  'I  always  like  to  take  advantage  of 
my  r,  oducuve  moods,'  he  said  to  me.  Thus  he  often  had 
several  irons  in  the  fire,  only  one  of  which  might  be 
.intimately  finished.  Probably  he  saw  that  the  last  iron 
promised  to  work  up  better  than  the  first.  He  never 
could  be  made  to  work  like  a  machine,  turning  out  a 
definite  quantity  at  regular  intervale.  He  never  felt 
bound  to  regard  the  rule  that  you  must  finish  one  thing 
before  you  begin  another,  so  emphatically  presented  in 
the  old  copy-books." 

The  fact  here  stated  concerning  the  habits  of  Agassiz, 
points  to  an  important  principle  of  intellectual  labor  which 
merits  the  attention  of  all  mental  workers.  There  are 
some  persons  who  seem  to  think  the  great  end  and  aim 
of  life  is  to  practice  the  minor  virtues.  To  be  courte 
ous,  punctual,  economical  in  the  management  of  time  and 
money, —  to  do  one  thing  at  a  time,  and  never  to  pro- 

272 


WORKING   BY   RULE.  273 

crastinate,— in  short,  moral  dexterity  and  handiness, — 
are  qualities  which  they  never  tire  of  glorifying,  and 
which,  above  all  others,  they  aim  to  exemplify  in  their 
own  lives  and  characters.  Almost  every  liberally-edu 
cated  man  can  remember  some  persons  of  this  class  whom 
he  knew  in  college, — young  men  who  were  marked  by 
their  associates  for  their  enslavement  to  certain  stiff, 
cast-iron  rules,  more  inflexible  than  the  laws  of  the 
Medes  and  Persians,  so  often  referred  to  by  stump-speak 
ers, — -by  which  they  regulated  their  minutest  actions. 
Over  their  mantels  were  posted  a  long  string  of  regula 
tions,  which,  at  a  heroic  sacrifice  of  comfort,  they  daily 
and  sedulously  observed, —  such  as  these:  "Remember 
to:  1.  Rise  at  6.  2.  Recitation  at  7.  3.  Breakfast  at  8. 
4.  Exercise  half  an  hour.  5.  Study  two  hours;"  and  so 
on.  If  they  had  an  hour  or  a  half-hour  for  general  read 
ing,  they  would  read  to  the  end  of  it  with  the  most 
exemplary  conscientiousness,  however  stupid  they  felt,  or 
however  persistently  their  wits  went  wool-gathering;  and, 
on  the  other  hand,  they  would  shut  the  book  exactly  on 
the  instant  when  the  minute-hand  got  opposite  the  dot, 
however  deeply  the  passage  might  chance  to  interest  them. 
Such  martyrs  to  method  are  generally  very  conscientious 
men,  who  honestly  wish  to  make  the  most  of  their  facul 
ties  and  opportunities;  but  generally,  we  fear  that  they 
are  not  overstocked  with  brains,  and,  as  they  do  not 
create  a  prodigious  sensation  in  college,  so  they  are 
rarely  guilty  of  setting  any  rivers  on  fire  after  gradua 
tion.  It  was  good  people  of  this  kind  that  Sir  Walter 
Scott  had  in  his  mind's  eye  when  he  said  he  had  never 
known  a  man  of  genius  who  could  be  perfectly  regular 
in  his  habits,  whilst  he  had  known  many  blockheads  who 


274  WORKING   BY   EULE. 

could.  The  Roman  poet,  Juvenal,  with  his  usual  vigor 
ous  touch,  has  painted  a  "  representative  man "  of  this 
class : 

"  If  he  but  walk  a  mile,  he  first  must  look 
For  the  fit  hour  and  minute  in  his  book; 
If  his  eye  itch,  the  pain  will  still  endure, 
Nor,  till  a  scheme  be  raised,  apply  the  cure." 

Now,  it  is  well  to  have  some  method  in  one's  actions, 
—  even  in  one's  madness,  as  did  Hamlet;  but  to  be 
shackled  by  many  and  minute  rules  of  conduct, —  to  rule 
all  one's  actions  with  a  ruler, —  to  divide  one's  time  with 
a  pair  of  compasses,  and  allow  precisely  so  much  to  this 
thing  and  so  much  to  that, —  is  an  intolerable  torment. 
The  virtues  that  accompany  method, —  such  as  punctu 
ality,  the  disposition  not  to  loiter,  and  the  power  of 
working  up  spare  moments  for  useful  purposes, —  are  all 
commendable;  they  help  a  man  to  do  his  work  triumph 
antly,  and  in  an  easy,  assured  manner;  but  it  is  possible 
to  overrate  their  value.  They  oil  the  wheels  of  life,  and 
make  them  run  without  hitch  or  creaking;  but  they  do 
not  determine  the  character  of  that  life.  Their  only 
value  is  derivative,  and  they  have  no  more  power  to  do 
the  business  of  life  than  a  pulley  has  to  lift  a  weight. 
Robert  Hall  used  to  say  of  early  rising,  that  the  real 
question  was  not  what  time  you  get  up,  but  what  do 
you  do  when  you  are  up.  So  method  and  the  improve 
ment  of  time  are  important  in  themselves;  but  a  far 
more  important  question  is,  how  do  you  improve  your 
time?  It  is  well  to  be  at  your  post  at  the  very  moment 
the  clock  strikes  the  hour;  but  it  is  far  more  important 
to  be  able  to  discharge  its  duties  after  you  have  got 
there.  Mental  stature,  intellectual  power,  has  not  a  very 
close  relation,  we  fear,  to  the  virtues  of  a  martinet.  A 


WORKING   BY   RULE.  275 

wise,  thoughtful,  useful  man, —  a  clear-headed  reasoner,  a 
profound  thinker, —  may  be  immethodical,  dilatory,  slov 
enly,  just  as  a  giant  may  be  clumsy,  awkward,  and 
loose  in  all  his  make-up. 

Perhaps  no  two  persons  were  ever  more  unlike  each 
other,  in  respect  to  method  or  system,  than  Southey  and 
Coleridge.  They  strikingly  illustrate  the  advantages  and 
drawbacks  of  the  habit  of  mind  which  has  been  so  much 
lauded.  Southey  was  as  regular  as  a  clock.  Always 
prompt  and  punctual,  he  did  his  work  with  the  exactness 
and  precision  of  a  machine;  and  the  watch  no  sooner 
ticked  the  hour  than  his  literary  tale  of  brick  was  forth 
coming.  He  wrote  poetry  before  breakfast ;  he  read  during 
breakfast;  he  read  history  till  dinner;  he  corrected  proof- 
sheets  between  dinner  and  tea;  he  wrote  an  essay  for  the 
"Quarterly"  afterwards;  and  after  supper  composed  "The 
Doctor,"  an  elaborate  jest.  Never  was  there  a  greater 
miser  of  time;  never,  since  Pliny,  were  moments  so  con 
scientiously  improved.  Even  when  walking  for  exercise, 
he  took  a  book  with  him.  But  what  does  his  life  prove, 
except  that  the  habits  of  mind  best  fitted  for  communi 
cating  information, —  habits  formed  with  the  greatest  care, 
and  daily  regulated  by  the  best  motives, —  are  exactly 
the  habits  which  are  likely  to  afford  a  man  the  least  in 
formation  to  communicate?  Southey's  works  are  prodigies 
of  learning  and  labor;  but  who  reads  them  now?  What 
work  has  he  produced  which  the  world  "  will  not  will 
ingly  let  die  " ;  what  bold,  striking  thoughts  has  he  uttered 
which  stick  in  the  memory  like  barbed  arrows,  that  can 
not  be  withdrawn?  Of  the  hundred  and  three  volumes, 
which,  in  addition  to  the  one  hundred  and  fifty  review- 
articles,  he  so  painfully  composed,  not  one,  in  all  proba- 


276  WORKING   BY   RULE. 

bility,  except  possibly  the  "  Life  of  Nelson,"  of  which  his 
publisher  dictated  the  subject  and  size,  will  be  read  fifty 
years  hence.  The  truth  is,  Southey  read  and  wrote  so 
systematically  and  so  mechanically, —  so  much  like  a  ma 
chine, —  that  his  life  was  monotonous  and  humdrum;  it 
had  no  adventures,  changes,  events,  or  experiences;  and 
hence  his  works  show  a  painful  want  of  intellectual  bone 
and  muscle,  and  rarely  touch  the  hearts  or  thrill  the 
sympathies  of  his  hearers.  Gorgeous  passages  may  be 
found  in  them, —  proofs  of  vigorous  fancy  and  imagina 
tion;  but  his  persons  and  their  adventures  are  so  super 
natural —  so  dreamy,  phantom-like,  and  out  of  the  circle 
of  human  sympathies,  both  in  their  triumphs  and  suffer 
ings, —  that  his  elaborate  and  ambitious  poems  produce 
on  us  the  impression  of  a  splendid  but  unsubstantial 
nightmare. 

Now  look  at  Coleridge.  He  passed  his  whole  life  out  at 
elbows,  physically  and  morally.  He  loitered  and  dawdled; 
he  wasted  whole  weeks  and  months;  he  had  no  sense  of  the 
value  of  minutes ;  he  prosecuted  a  thousand  literary  schemes 
which  were  never  finished;  and,  when  he  died,  left  behind 
him,  as  Lamb  playfully  said,  "  forty  thousand  treatises  on 
metaphysics  and  divinity,  not  one  of  them  complete."  It 
is  in  these  fragments, —  in  casual  remarks,  scribbled  often 
on  the  margins  of  books,  and  reminding  us  of  the  Sibyl's 
leaves, —  in  imperfectly-reported  conversations,  and  in  a 
few  brief  but  exquisitely-harmonized  poems,  that  we  must 
look  for  the  proof  of  Coleridge's  mighty  but  imperfectly- 
recorded  powers.  Yet  who  that  is  familiar  with  these,  and 
with  the  writings  of  Southey,  can  doubt  that  Coleridge  was 
by  far  the  greater  man  of  the  two;  and  who  can  help 
suspecting  that  there  was,  if  not  a  direct  connection,  at 


WORKING   BY   RULE.  277 

least  a  strong  sympathy  between  his  genius  and  his  sloven 
liness?  He  had,  as  another  has  said,  a  gift  for  seeing  the 
difficulties  of  life,  its  seamy  side,  its  incongruities  and  con 
tradictions,  which  he  would  probably  have  lost  if  he  had 
been  more  respectable  and  victorious. 

"  But  Agassiz's  or  Coleridge's  method  of  working  would 
be  ruinous  to  any  man  who  had  not  their  wonderful  facul 
ties,  their  far-sight  and  insight."  No  doubt;  and  therefore 
neither  of  them  ever  proposed  his  own  method  of  working 
as  a  model  for  others.  "  Once,  in  my  presence,"  says  the 
correspondent  of  the  "  Tribune,"  "  a  near  relative  ventured 
to  ask  him  (Agassiz)  if  he  did  not  think  he  would  accom 
plish  more  if  he  finished  one  thing  before  he  began  another. 
'  Every  man  must  work  according  to  his  own  method,'  he 
replied.  It  was  frequently  a  hard  thing  to  get  him  to  sign 
a  paper,  or  write  a  letter  (except  for  somebody  else),  or  to 
look  over  accounts,  or  to  do  little  routine  work.  Yet  he 
could  never  have  attained  his  great  eminence  in  science  if 
he  had  not  paid,  in  his  department,  great  attention  to  the 
minutest  and  apparently  the  most  insignificant  details. 
Looking  at  the  drawing  of  a  fish  made  by  his  artist,  he 
said,  after  taking  a  single  glance,  '  It  is  a  beautiful  draw 
ing,  but  don't  you  see  you  have  left  out  two  or  three  of  the 
scales  ? ' ' 

The  sum  of  the  matter  is,  method,  like  fire,  is  a  good 
slave,  but  a  bad  master,  and  is  too  apt  to  degenerate,  like 
other  minor  virtues,  into  mere  priggishness.  As  intel 
lectual  companions,  your  systematic,  square-rule-and-com- 
pass  men  are,  of  all  persons,  the  dullest  and  most  unsatis 
fying.  "  I  do  not  like,"  says  the  charming  French  writer, 
Xavier  De  Maistre,  in  his  "  Voyage  autour  de  ma  Chambre," 
"  people  who  are  so  completely  the  masters  of  their  steps  and 


278  WORKING    BY   RULE. 

their  ideas  that  they  say  to  themselves,  '  To-day  I  will  make 
three  visits;  I  will  write  four  letters;  I  will  finish  that 
work  which  I  have  begun.'  ''  We  sympathize  with  him. 
We  respect  the  literary  Pharisees,  who  tithe  mental  mint, 
anise,  and  cummin,  with  scrupulous  regularity;  but  we 
cannot  love  them.  Even  in  morals,  it  is  not  the  most 
straight-laced  persons, —  the  "unco  guid,"  who  never 
deviate  by  a  hair's  breadth  from  the  path  of  propriety, — 
that  are  the  best  Christians,  the  best  neighbors  and  citizens, 
parents  or  children,  husbands  or  wives.  John  Milton 
has  justly  denounced  those  scrupulists  "  who,  when  God 
has  set  us  in  a  fair  allowance  of  way,  never  leave  subtle- 
izing  and  casuisting  till  they  have  straightened  and  pared 
that  liberal  path  into  a  razor's  edge  to  walk  on."  And 
the  wise  old  Gascon,  Montaigne,  with  his  usual  sagacity, 
observes  of  systems  of  conduct  generally,  that  a  young  man 
ought  sometimes  "  to  cross  his  own  rules"  to  awake  his 
vigor,  and  to  keep  it  from  growing  faint  and  rusty;  "for 
there  is  no  course  of  life  so  weak  as  that  which  is  carried 
on  by  rule  and  discipline."  The  reader  of  Dickens  will 
remember  the  old  clock  at  Dr.  Blimber's,  whose  monotonous 
beat  rapped  every  second  on  the  head  as  soon  as  it  was 
born,  killing  it  stone-dead  on  the  spot.  Like  this,  we  fear, 
is  the  murderous  clock-work  of  many  human  lives. 


TOO  MUCH  SPEAKING. 


~T~~\0  we  need  more  public  speakers  in  this  country?  We 
-•— ^  ask  the  question  because  we  often  see  paragraphs 
going  the  rounds  of  the  press,  advising  fathers  to  teach 
their  boys  to  "spout"  as  a  means  of  getting  on  in  the 
world,  considering  the  countless  occasions  on  which,  in  this 
country,  a  man  is  called  to  address  his  fellows.  Moreover, 
we  are  reminded  that  the  speaking  class  par  eminence, — 
that  is,  the  lawyers, —  usually  number  nine-tenths  of  the 
United  States  Congress. 

There  is  force  in  these  suggestions;  yet  we  are  fully  of 
the  opinion  that  the  advice  is  mischievous;  that,  instead  of 
swelling  the  number  of  public  speakers  in  this  country,  it 
would  be  a  mercy  to  the  community,  and  should  be  the 
solicitude  of  every  one  having  the  control  of  boys,  to 
diminish  it.  This  running  at  the  mouth  has  become  a 
terrible  epidemic,  and  we  believe  that  the  health  of  the 
body  politic  demands  that  it  should  be  checked  rather  than 
encouraged.  The  facility  for  extempore  speaking  which 
dazzles  so  many  persons,  begets  self-conceit  and  a  thirst  for 
public  notice,  and  tempts  thousands  of  our  young  men  to 
seek  temporary  notoriety  at  the  expense  of  a  solid  and 
enduring  reputation.  Instead  of  cultivating  and  disciplin 
ing  their  brains,  storing  their  minds  with  the  hived  wisdom 
of  the  ages,  and,  above  all,  acquiring  that  most  valuable 
and  important  of  all  arts,  the  art  of  thinking  consecutively 
and  with  effect,  they  study  clap-trap  and  sensational 

279 


280  TOO   MUCH   SPEAKING. 

oratory, —  the  art  of  producing  instantaneous  and  ephem 
eral,  instead  of  deep  and  lasting  effects.  Habits  of  speak 
ing  thus  formed  speedily  react  on  the  habits  of  thinking, 
and  instead  of  weighing  questions  carefully  and  trying  to 
ascertain  their  merits,  young  men  view  them  only  as 
pegs  upon  which  to  hang  speeches.  An  easy  utterance, 
a  lively  verbosity,  a  knack  of  stinging  invective,  and  a 
command  of  that  piquant  ridicule  which  always  brings 
down  the  house,  soon  come  to  be  preferred  to  the  pro- 
foundest  knowledge,  the  largest  grasp  of  mind,  and  the 
most  thorough  comprehension  of  a  subject,  which,  owing 
to  the  very  embarras  des  richesses,  hems  and  stammers  in 
trying  to  wreak  itself  upon  expression. 

There  is  hardly  any  gift  so  dangerous  or  so  worthless 
as  what  is  vulgarly  termed  eloquence.  The  French  have 
rightly  characterized  it  as  the  flux  de  bouche, —  a  mental 
diarrhoea.  It  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  it  is  difficult 
to  acquire  the  faculty  of  fluent  speaking;  almost  any  man 
can  succeed  who  will  try  often,  and  who  can  harden  him 
self  against  the  mortification  of  frequent  failures.  Com 
plete  self-possession  and  a  ready  flow  of  language  may  thus 
be  acquired  mechanically;  but  it  will  be  the  self-possession 
of  ignorance,  and  the  fluency  of  comparative  emptiness. 
Such  a  habit  may  teach  him  something  of  arrangement, 
and  a  few  of  the  simplest  methods  of  making  an  impres 
sion;  but,  as  Lord  Brougham  has  said,  "his  diction  is  sure 
to  be  much  worse  than  if  he  never  made  the  attempt. 
Such  a  speaker  is  never  in  want  of  a  word,  and  hardly 
ever  has  one  that  is  worth  having."  The  truth  is,  full 
men  are  seldom  fluent.  Washington  seldom  spoke  in 
public,  and  when  he  did,  it  was  in  a  few  pointed  sentences, 
dnlivered  in  an  easy,  conversational  way.  In  the  conyen- 


TOO   MUCH    SPEAKING.  281 

tion  that  framed  the  Constitution  of  the  United  States  he 
made  but  two  speeches,  of  a  few  words  each;  yet  the  con 
vention  acknowledged  the  master  spirit,  and  it  is  said  that 
but  for  the  thirty  words  of  his  first  speech,  the  Constitution 
Would  have  been  rejected  by  the  people.  Neither  Franklin 
nor  Jefferson  had  "  the  gift  of  gab,"  though  the  one  wrote 
the  Declaration  of  Independence,  and  the  other  "  snatched 
the  lightning  from  the  skies  and  the  sceptre  from  tyrants." 
Though  silent  and  slow-tongued,  each  in  the  weightiest 
debate  was  effective,  because  he  spoke  tersely  and  from  a 
full  mind,  and  drove  a  nail  home  with  every  blow.  The 
latter  changed  the  messages  of  the  Executive  to  Congress 
from  oral  to  written  discourses,  because  of  his  aversion  to 
public  speaking.  President  Jackson  was  as  tongue-tied  as 
Grant.  Napoleon  said  that  his  greatest  difficulty  in  ruling 
was  in  finding  men  of  deeds  rather  than  of  words.  When 
asked  how  he  maintained  his  influence  over  his  superiors  in 
age  and  experience  when  he  commanded  in  Italy,  he  said, 
"  By  reserve."  Moltke  is  said  to  be  silent  in  eight  lan 
guages.  He  rarely  speaks,  except  in  the  crash  of  solid 
shot  and  the  shriek  of  the  angry  shell.  When  the  Creator 
was  to  choose  a  man  for  the  greatest  work  ever  done  in 
this  world,  it  was  Moses,  the  man  "slow  of  speech,"  and 
not  Aaron,  the  man  who  could  "  speak  well,"  that  He 
commissioned.  It  was  said  of  Col.  John  Allen,  a  Kentucky 
jurist,  that  he  knew  more  than  he  could  say  •  and  of  the 
noted  Isham  Talbot,  whose  tongue  ran  like  a  flutter-mill, 
that  he  said  more  than  he  knew. 

The  most  convincing  speakers  have  been  niggard  of 
their  words.  The  reason  why  the  classic  orators  of  an 
tiquity  spoke  with  such  terseness  and  condensed  energy, 
is  that  they  turned  over  their  subjects  long  and  deeply, 


282  TOO   MUCH   SPEAKIKG. 

and  made  the  pen  a  constant  auxiliary  of  the  tongue. 
By  this  double  means  —  the  cogitatio  et  commentatio,  as 
Cicero  calls  it,  added  to  the  assidua  ac  diligens  scriptura, — 
they  laid  up  in  the  arsenal  of  the  memory  a  supply  of 
weapons  for  any  emergency  that  might  arise;  and  the 
sentences  thus  turned  over  and  over  in  the  laboratory  of 
thought,  and  submitted  to  criticism  and  revision  by  being 
embodied  in  written  composition,  were  immeasurably  more 
weighty  and  effective  than  those  which  in  our  day  are 
thrown  off  in  the  hurry  of  debate,  when  there  is  no  time 
to  pause  for  the  best  thoughts  and  the  most  pregnant 
and  pointed  expression. 

It  is  said  that  the  Germans,  long-winded  as  they  are  in 
their  books,  and  though  they  will  endure  any  amount  of 
printed  matter,  unappalled  by  size  of  volume,  number  of 
pages,  or  closeness  of  type,  will  not  tolerate  a  long  speech 
out  of  a  lecture-room.  A  ten-minutes'  harangue  is  an 
exception;  one  of  an  hour's  length  is  a  phenomenon;  one 
of  two  hours  never  dreamed  of;  and  as  for  the  feat  of 
speaking  four  or  five  hours  consecutively,  which  has  been 
achieved  by  some  leathern-lunged  American  politicians,  it 
is  looked  upon  as  an  impossibility,  or,  if  credited  on  evi 
dence  too  positive  to  doubt,  is  ranked  with  rope-dancing, 
balancing  one's  self  heels  upward  on  the  point  of  a  steeple, 
or  similar  eccentric  and  useless  performances  to  which  men 
sometimes  pervert  their  powers. 

The  weightiest  men  in  the  British  Parliament  have  ever 
been  slow  of  speech.  For  a  speaker  who  has  something  to 
say,  John  Bull  has  an  exhaustless  patience;  but  for  mere 
loquacity  he  has  an  unmitigated  contempt.  Hemming  and 
hawing, —  stammering, —  want  of  tact, —  poverty  of  diction, 
—  all  are  borne  with  patience,  so  long  as  the  hearers 


TOO   MUCH    SPEAKING.  283 

believe  that  the  speaker  has  some  special  knowledge,  some 
telling  fact,  some  wise  suggestion,  which  he  will  contrive 
to  get  out,  if  he  is  suffered  to  take  his  own  time  and  way. 
But  the  instant  a  suspicion  arises  that  he  is  talking  "  for 
buncombe," — that  he  is  trying  to  dazzle  his  hearers  with 
oratorical  pyrotechnics, —  that  he  is,  in  short,  vox  et  preterea 
nihil, —  they  give  reins  to  their  indignation,  and  cough  him 
down  without  mercy.  So  far  is  this  carried,  that  a  traveler 
tells  us  that,  in  the  House  of  Commons,  it  is  almost  unpar 
liamentary  to  be  fluent, —  to  speak  right  on,  without  hem 
ming  and  hawing;  and  quite  unlordly,  because  smelling 
of  a  professional  aptitude,  to  march  through  a  long  sentence 
without  losing  the  way, —  without  stumbling  over  Lindley 
Murray  and  possibly  the  Queen  herself, —  and  without  the 
speaker  coming  out  of  the  sentence  at  last  nearly  where  he 
went  in.  The  most  skilful  debaters  in  that  body,  instead 
of  spinning  out  their  words  like  a  juggler  blowing  endless 
ribbons  from  his  mouth,  cultivate  a  prudent  reticence. 
Like  Anthony,  they  are  plain,  blunt  men.  They  shrink 
from  antithesis,  and  epigram,  and  point,  and  regard  fluency 
as  a  debater's  most  dangerous  snare.  Nor  is  this  opinion 
ill-grounded.  Its  truth  was  strikingly  illustrated  a  few 
years  ago  by  the  comparative  success  of  that  brilliant  par 
liamentary  orator,  Mr.  Horsman,  and  Lord  Falmerston.  It 
was  remarked  that  the  very  brilliancy  of  Mr.  Horsman 
converted  his  hearers  into  hostile  critics,  piquing  themselves 
upon  their  skill  in  seeing  through  the  magic  colors  in  which 
his  genius  shrouded  the  truth ;  whereas  Lord  Palmerston's 
dexterous  hemming  and  hawing  only  made  his  audience 
sympathetically  anxious  to  help  the  struggle  of  the  honest 
advocate  of  a  sound  cause  against  the  disadvantages  of  his 
own  oratorical  defects. 


284  TOO   MUCH   SPEAKING. 

If  an  Englishman  would  succeed  as  a  speaker,  lie  first 
seeks  to  store  his  mind  with  facts,  and,  before  studying 
oratorical  tricks  and  arts,  he  tries  by  patient  study  and 
profound  meditation  to  master  the  subjects  upon  which 
there  is  a  demand  for  knowledge.  Not  till  he  has  honestly 
worked  out  a  problem  by  brooding  over  it  like  a  hen  over 
her  eggs,  does  he  prepare  to  lay  the  solution  of  it  before 
the  public.  What  is  the  secret  of  Mr.  Bright's  oratorical 
power?  Practice  in  debating  clubs?  No;  but  the  habits 
of  keen  observation  and  reflection  fostered  by  his  public 
and  private  life, —  the  constant  claims  on  ease  and  readiness 
caused  by  a  political  canvass,  the  demand  on  the  resources 
of  practical  comment  and  sagacious  observation  made  at 
the  hustings  or  in  the  House  of  Commons.  It  is  because 
he  has  brooded  for  years  in  solitude  over  the  subjects  on 
which  he  has  delivered  himself  with  so  much  fire,  that  his 
mind  has  acquired  that  depth  of  passion,  earnestness,  and 
force  which  the  playful  and  facile  contests  of  the  college 
debating  society  would  only  have  diluted  and  diminished. 
In  short,  oratory  is  the  weapon  of  an  athlete,  and  it  can 
never  be  wielded  to  any  purpose  by  a  mere  stripling.  The 
heroes  of  collegiate  discussions  gain  intellectual  agilit}7, 
readiness,  facility;  but  this  suppleness  of  mind  is  too  often 
gained  at  the  expense  of  higher  and  more  sterling  qualities, 
and  especially  of  that  unity  of  personal  character  which  is 
one  of  the  great  sources  of  impressiveness.  It  takes  serious 
business  and  real  purpose  to  train  the  orator;  and  if  the 
aspirant  begins  his  career  too  early,  the  strain  is  too  great 
for  the  system  that  is  to  support  it, —  the  tax  eats  into  the 
capital, —  the  practice,  in  Shakespeare's  words', 

"Lays  on  snch  burdens  as  to  bear  them 
The  back  is  sacrifice  to  the  load." 


TOO    MUCH    SPEAKING.  285 

College  life  and  college  debating-clubs,  it  has  been 
truly  said,  give  brightness,  alertness,  wit,  candor,  fair 
ness,  grace,  to  the  intellects  which  they  discipline;  but 
they  do  not  give,  they  rather  take  away,  that  effect  of 
intensity  and  massiveness,  that  subduing  and  overpower 
ing  impressiveness  which  come  of  brooding  thought  and 
purpose, —  which  come,  that  is,  of  the  tone  of  mind  which 
has  not  accustomed  itself  to  look  at  questions  with  other 
men's  eyes.  It  is  because  he  cares  less  for  manner  than 
for  matter, —  less  to  be  quick  and  fluent  than  to  be  strong 
and  full, —  because  he  thinks  long  and  deeply  on  the 
subject  which  he  speaks  upon, —  that  the  English  orator 
is  weightier  and  more  impressive  than  the  American. 
The  English  care  most  for  the  foundation  of  their 
speeches;  we,  for  the  superstructure.  We  fight  splendidly 
in  debate,  but  it  is  to  win  or  perish,  and  we  exhaust 
ourselves  by  a  single  effort.  They  have  less  dash  and 
brilliancy,  but  great  reserved  force,  and  renew  the  attack 
to-morrow  with  as  much  vigor  as  at  the  first  onset.  It 
has  been  justly  said  that  "  if  the  maiden  speeches  of 
some  of  England's  most  brilliant  and  polished  debaters 
have  been  downright  failures,  it  has  been  owing  to  inex 
perience,  not  to  the  lack  of  solid  information, —  to  want 
of  practice  in  the  tricks  and  mechanical  devices  of  oratory, 
and  in  no  degree  to  the  absence  of  convictions  or  sound 
thought." 

But,  says  some  one,  is  it  then,  of  no  importance  to 
cultivate  the  faculty  of  speech?  Do  not  men  of  fine 
abilities  sacrifice  half  their  power  and  influence  by  not 
learning  the  art  of  speaking  well  in  public?  Is  it  not 
painful  to  see  a  man  who  has  spent  years  in  self-culture, 
standing  dumb  as  a  heathen  oracle,  or  with  his  intellect 


286  TOO   MUCH   SPEAKING. 

smitten  with  indescribable  confusion,  the  moment  he  opens 
his  lips  in  public,  for  lack  of  a  few  happy  sentences  in 
which  to  embody  his  thoughts?  Yes;  but  it  is  not  neces 
sary  to  join  a  debating  club,  or  to  thrust  one's  self  for 
ward  as  a  speaker  in  all  assemblies,  in  order  to  become 
a  good  public  speaker.  Every  time  one  opens  his  lips  in 
society,  he  has  an  opportunity  to  acquire  and  strengthen 
the  habit  of  giving  clear  and  forcible  utterance  to  his 
thoughts.  Instead,  then,  of  bidding  our  young  men 
"  spout,"  we  would  bid  them  read  widely,  think  deeply, 
reas  in  logically,  and  act  sensibly.  We  would  with  Richter 
exhort  them  never  to  speak  on  a  subject  till  they  have  read 
themselves  full  upon  it,  and  never  to  read  upon  a  subject 
till  they  have  thought  themselves  hungry  upon  it.  When 
a  sensible  and  thoughtful  man  has  anything  to  say,  he  will 
always  find  a  way  of  saying  it,  when  circumstances  require 
him  to  speak.  On  the  other  hand,  if  a  young  man  begins 
spouting  on  all  occasions,  while  his  faculties  are  yet  imma 
ture,  and  his  knowledge  scanty,  crude,  and  ill-arranged,  he 
will  be  almost  sure  to  retain  through  life  a  fatal  facility  for 
pouring  forth  ill-digested  thoughts  in  polished  periods,  and 
a  hatred  for  cautious  reflection.  We  have  rarely  known 
a  fluent  speaker  who  said  things  that  stuck  like  burrs  in 
the  memory;  but  we  have  heard  hesitating  and  artless 
talkers  who  have  blurted  out  the  most  original,  the  deepest 
and  the  most  pregnant  things  which  we  have  cared  to 
remember.  No, —  we  want  no  more  spouting.  We  want 
thought,  and  taste,  and  brevity,  and  that  Doric  simplicity 
of  style  which  is  so  nearly  allied  to  the  highest  and  most 
effective  eloquence. 


A  FORGOTTEN  WIT. 


TTTHAT  is  more  uncertain  than  literary  fame?  The 
*  *  history  of  literature  shows  that,  if  it  is  one  of  the 
most  enviable  of  human  possessions,  it  is  at  the  same 
time  one  of  the  most  fleeting.  There  is  scarcely  any 
thing  about  which  one  can  prophesy  with  so  little  cer 
tainty  as  concerning  the  future  fame  of  an  author  who 
is  now  the  pet  or  favorite  of  the  reading  world.  Fifty 
years  ago  Byron  was  the  poetic  idol  of  the  public;  and 
Macaulay  did  not  exaggerate  when  he  said  that  all  the 
readers  of  verse  in  England, —  nay,  in  Europe, —  hastened 
to  sit  at  his  feet.  Now,  instead  of  having  his  thousands 
of  worshipers,  who  drink  gin  ceaselessly,  and  strive,  in 
turned-down  collars,  to  look  Conrad-like  and  misanthropic, 
he  is  barely  a  power  in  literature.  Who  reads  Crabbe  now, 
or  South ey,  or  Moore?  Yet  Crabbe,  the  "  Pope  in  worsted 
stockings,"  was  so  famous  in  his  day  as  to  create  a  decided 
sensation  at  the  hotel  where  he  stayed  on  visiting  London; 
Southey,  who,  as  a  poet,  is  remembered  to-day  only  by 
a  few  pieces  and  passages  which  he  himself  pronounced 
clap-trap,  believed  that  his  ponderous  epics  would  be  im 
mortal;  and  Moore,  whose  songs  were  sung  in  a  thousand 
drawing-rooms,  might  well  have  believed  that  they,  at 
least,  would  not  be  ephemeridae.  Again,  what  reader  of 
to-day  has  toiled  through  the  seven  volumes  of  Richard 
son's  "Pamela";  or  how  many  have  ever  heard  the  name 
of  "Clarissa"  and  "Sir  Charles  Grandison"?  Yet  these 

287 


288  A   FORGOTTEN   WIT. 

were  the  novels  which  held  our  great-grandmothers  spell 
bound, —  which  were  more  popular  than  are  the  tales  of 
Dickens  or  Miss  Evans  now.  Rousseau  hung  over  Richard 
son's  pages  with  rapture;  and  Diderot  declared  that,  if 
forced  to  sell  his  books,  he  would  never  part  with  these, 
which  he  ranked  with  the  productions  of  Moses,  Homer, 
Euripides,  and  Sophocles.  Who  reads  Cleveland  now,  or 
"  the  great  Churchill,"  or  Hayley,  or  Dr.  Darwin,  or  Beattie's 
prose  or  poetry,  or  "  Fitzosborne's  Letters,"  which  reached 
its  eightieth  edition,  or  Blair's  Sermons,  which  sold  in 
their  day  like  Robertson's  Sermons  and  "  Ecce  Homo " 
in  ours?  These,  and  a  thousand  other  cases  that  might 
be  cited,  show  that  the  highest  contemporary  fame  is  no 
guarantee  of  immortality.  The  suddenness  with  which  an 
author  who  has  been  puffed  into  the  loftiest  elevation  is 
sometimes  hurled  into  the  gulf  of  forgetfulness  reminds 
one  of  the  vicissitudes  that  befell  Milton's  Satan  in  his 
flight  through  chaos: 

"His  sail-broad  vans 

He  spreads  for  flight,  and,  in  the  surging  smoke 
Uplifted,  ppnrns  the  ground;  thence,  many  a  league, 
As  in  a  cloudy  chair,  ascending,  rides 

Audacious 

....    All  unawares, 

Fluttering  his  pennons  vain,  plumh  down  he  drops 

Ten  thousand  fathoms  deep." 

These  reflections  have  been  provoked  by  a  perusal  of 
the  writings  of  Chamfort,  of  which  a  new  edition  was  pub 
lished  a  few  years  ago  in  Paris.  Though  a  leading  jour 
nalist  in  the  French  Revolution,  he  is  now  almost  forgotten 
in  Europe,  while  few  persons  in  America  have  even  heard 
of  his  name.  Sebastian  Roch  Nicholas  Chamfort  was  born 
in  1741,  near  Clermont,  in  Auvergne.  He  was  a  natural 


A    FORGOTTEN    WIT.  289 

son,  and  had  the  quickness  of  parts  which  the  proverb 
ascribes  to  such  children.  He  never  knew  who  his  father 
was.  His  mother,  who  was  a  dame  de  compagnie,  came  to 
Paris  to  hide  her  shame,  and  there  found  friends  and 
protectors,  through  whose  influence  he  found  a  boursier's 
place  at  the  College  of  the  Grassins.  Eather  a  dull  scholar 
at  first,  he  at  last  shone  forth  brilliantly,  and  in  his  third 
year  this  filius  nullius,  this  "  child  of  misery,  baptized  in 
tears,"  carried  off  the  five  grand  prizes  of  the  University. 
These  triumphs  determined  his  calling;  he  chose  letters. 
At  first  he  tried  to  get  employment  from  the  journals 
and  booksellers,  but  failed,  and  would  have  starved  had 
not  a  young  Abbe  paid  him  a  louis  a  week  for  writing 
sermons.  He  next  became  a  tutor;  then  secretary  to  a 
rich  citizen  of  Liege,  whom  he  followed  across  the  Rhine; 
but  they  soon  quarreled,  and  Chamfort  returned  to  Paris, 
saying  that  "  the  thing  in  the  world  for  which  he  was 
least  fitted  was  to  be  a  German."  An  indifferent  comedy, 
which  had  some  success,  and  the  winning  of  a  prize  at 
the  Academy,  and  another  at  the  Academy  of  Marseilles 
for  an  Eloge  on  La  Fontaine,  introduced  him  into  society, 
where  his  good  looks,  his  aplomb,  and  his  ready  and 
brilliant  wit,  soon  made  him  a  favorite.  Men  and  women 
of  rank  now  sought  him  and  doated  on  him.  That  they 
did  not  for  a  moment  suspect  the  intensity  of  pride  and 
the  rage  for  equality  which  slumbered  in  his  heart,  is  not 
strange;  for  far  keener  observers  were  deceived  than  the 
great  ladies  who  thus  caressed  him.  When  he  was  elected 
an  Academician,  Eivarol  said  that  he  was  "  like  a  bit  of 
lily-of-the-valley  in  a  bouquet  of  poppies."  The  lily-of- 
the-valley  exhaled  strange  and  deadly  poisons  with  its 
perfume. 


290  A    FOBGOrTEN    WIT. 

Gradually  the  gay  and  dissipated  life  which  Chamfort 
led  told  upon  his  health.  He  went  from  watering-place 
to  watering-place,  among  others  to  Spa  and  Bareges,  but 
with  little  benefit.  He  lost  the  vigor  and  good  looks 
which  led  the  Princess  of  Craon  to  say  of  him,  "  He  looks 
only  an  Adonis,  but  he  is  a  Hercules " ;  but  his  position 
was  assured.  Places  and  pensions  were  showered  upon 
him.  At  Bareges,  four  ladies  fell  in  love  with  him, 
among  them  Madame  de  Grammont  and  Madame  de 
Choiseul, — "  in  reality,"  wrote  Mdlle.  Lespinasse  to  a 
friend.  "  four  friends,  who  each  of  them  loved  him  with 
all  the  strength  of  four,'1  and  she  adds,  "he  is  very  well 
pleased,  and  tries  his  best  to  be  modest."  About  this 
time  he  wrote  his  tragedy  of  "  Mustapha  et  Zeanger,"  a 
play  which  has  been  much  praised  for  its  purity  of  style 
and  sweetness  of  sentiment, —  which  Sainte-Beuve  notes  as 
somewhat  singular  in  a  tragedy,  and  in  an  author  like 
Chamfort;  "he  reserved,"  adds  the  critic,  "all  his  sweet 
ness  for  his  tragedies.  He  shows  himself  a  feeble  disciple 
of  Racine  in  his  Bajazet,  and  of  Voltaire  in  Zaire."  Marie 
Antoinette,  nattered  by  some  allusions  to  herself  in  one  of 
his  tragedies,  gave  him  a  pension  of  one  thousand  two 
hundred  livres.  The  Prince  of  Conde  also  offered  him  the 
post  of  Secretaire  des  Commandements.  In  .spite  of  these 
successes,  however,  envy,  malice,  and  uncharitableness  con 
tinued  to  gnaw  at  his  heart.  His  acrid  sayings  about 
those  with  whom  he  lived  burn,  it  has  been  well  said,  the 
very  paper  on  which  they  are  written.  His  reply  to 
Rulhi£re,  itself  stinging  enough,  is  among  the  mildest  of 
them.  "  I  have  committed,"  said  the  wit  and  historian, 
"but  one  wickedness  in  my  life."  "When  will  it  end?" 
asked  Chamfort.  Resigning  his  secretaryship  in  a  fit  of 


A    FORGOTTEN"   WIT.  291 

spleen  and  misanthropy,  he  retired  to  Auteuil,  saying,  "  It 
is  not  with  the  living,  but  with  the  dead,  one  should  com 
mune,"  meaning,  of  course,  with  books.  His  communion 
had  hardly  begun,  before,  at  the  dangerous  age  of  forty, 
he  fell  in  love  with  the  Duchess  of  Maine,  a  beauty  who 
counted  eight-and-forty  winters.  They  married  and  lived 
together  but  a  few  months,  when  she  died,  and  her  hus 
band  relapsed  into  a  profound  melancholy.  The  secret  of 
his  unhappiness  at  this  time  was  his  inaction  and  his  ste 
rility.  Nothing,  as  Sainte-Beuve  truly  observes,  is  so  con 
soling  to  the  man  of  letters  as  to  produce;  nothing  better 
reconciles  him  with  others  and  with  himself.  The  excessive 
pleasures  in  which  Chamfort  had  indulged,  had  rapidly 
destroyed  his  health  and  his  youth.  "  I  have  destroyed  my 
passions,"  he  said,  "  pretty  much  as  a  violent  man  kills  his 
horse,  not  being  able  to  govern  him."  Made  an  Acade 
mician,  he  delivered  on  the  occasion  a  brilliant  discourse, 
and  immediately  after  published  a  "  Discourse  against  Acad 
emies."  Occasionally  he  went  to  Court,  where  the  Queen, 
Marie  Antoinette,  once  said  to  him:  "  Do  you  know,  M.  de 
Chamfort,  that  you  pleased  all  the  world  at  Versailles,  not 
by  your  wit,  but  in  spite  of  it?"  "  The  reason  is  easy  to 
find,"  replied  the  sparkling  satirist;  "at  Versailles  I  learn 
with  resignation  many  things  I  know  from  people  who  are 
completely  ignorant  of  them." 

When  the  Revolution  burst  forth,  Chamfort' s  friendship 
was  sought  by  Mirabeau.  The  influence  he  soon  had  with 
the  great  Tribune  is  the  highest  proof  of  his  sagacity  and 
power.  In  his  letters  to  Chamfort,  Mirabeau  recognizes 
him  as  not  only  his  dearest  and  most  sympathetic,  but  as 
his  most  suggestive  and  inspiring  friend.  "  I  cannot  deny 
myself  the  pleasure,"  said  Mirabeau  to  him,  "of  rubbing 


292  A   FORGOTTEN   WIT. 

the  most  electric  head  I  have  ever  known.  There  is  hardly 
a  day  I  do  not  find  myself  saying,  'Chamfort  froncerait  le 
sourcil;  ne  faisons  pas,  rfecrivons  pas  cela"1  •  or,  on  the 
other  hand,  'Cliamfort  sera  content' "  In  the  union  of  the 
two  men  there  was  just  that  blending  of  opposite  qualities 
which  is  essential  to  the  strongest  friendship.  Delicacy, 
neatness,  subtlety,  finesse,  characterized  the  one;  force,  im 
petuosity,  fury,  sensibility,  predominated  in  the  other, — 
each  supplementing  the  other's  defects.  Throwing  himself 
into  the  revolutionary  struggles,  Cham  fort  defended  the 
new  doctrine  with  heart,  mind,  tongue,  and  pen;  and,  in 
the  enthusiasm  of  the  hour,  though  his  whole  fortune  was 
in  pensions,  vindicated  the  decree  that  suppressed  them. 
For  a  time  he  was  one  of  the  most  active  and  powerful 
revolutionary  journalists;  but,  at  last,  as  the  Reign  of 
Terror  grew  darker,  he  was  shocked  and  disgusted  by  its 
atrocities,  and  began  to  denounce  the  reigning  furies  in 
vehement  terms.  Indignant  at  the  mockery  of  the  words 
"Fraternity"  and  "Liberty"  traced  on  all  the  walls,  he 
translated  them  thus:  "Be  my  brother,  or  I  kill  thee." 
He  used  to  liken  the  fraternity  of  the  revolutionary  cut 
throats  to  that  of  Cain  and  Abel.  Finally  he  was  denounced 
by  an  employe  in  the  National  Library,  of  which  he  had 
been  made  one  of  the  Librarians  by  Roland,  and  was 
hurried  to  prison.  Soon  after  he  was  released;  but,  find 
ing  himself  "  shadowed  "  by  a  gendarme,  he  mentally  swore 
that  he  would  die  rather  than  go  back  to  the  dungeon. 
Being  seized  again  by  the  myrmidons  of  power,  he  tried 
first  to  shoot,  then  to  stab  himself,  but  only  succeeded  in 
inflicting  ugly  wounds.  "  You  see  what  it  is  to  be  mal 
adroit  in  the  use  of  one's  hands,"  he  exclaimed;  "one  can 
not  even  kill  one's  self  to  escape  the  pangs  of  tyranny." 


A   FORGOTTEN   WIT.  293 

In  spite  of  a  ball  in  his  head,  the  loss  of  one  eye,  and 
other  mutilations,  he  recovered,  but  only  to  live  for  a 
brief  time,  dying  on  the  13th  of  April,  1793,  in  the  fifty- 
second  year  of  his  age.  It  was  still  the  Reign  of  Terror, 
and  but  three  friends  dared  to  follow  him  to  the  tomb. 
It  was  his  opinion  to  the  last,  that  the  pistol-ball,  with 
which  he  had  attempted  to  blow  out  his  brains,  was  still 
in  his  head.  "Je  sens,"  said  he,  "  que  la  balle  est  restd 
dans  ma  tete-  Us  n'iront  pas  Vy  chercher" 

Chateaubriand,  describing  the  personal  appearance  of 
Chamfort,  says  that  "  he  was  pale-faced  and  of  a  delicate  com 
plexion.  His  blue  eye,  occasionally  cold  and  veiled  when 
unexcited,  sparkled  and  flashed  with  fire  when  he  became 
animated.  His  slightly  open  nostrils  gave  to  his  counte 
nance  an  expression  of  energetic  sensibility.  His  voice 
was  flexible,  and  its  modulations  followed  the  movements 
of  his  soul;  but  in  the  last  days  of  my  sojourn  at  Paris, 
it  had  acquired  some  asperity,  and  one  detected  in  it  the 
agitated  and  imperious  accent  of  the  factions." 

The  best  edition  of  Chamfort  for  the  English  reader 
is  that  edited  by  Arsene  Houssaye,  which  contains  his 
choicest  pieces,  omitting  all  of  temporary  interest.  Few 
books  contain  a  greater  amount  of  sparkling  wit,  delicate 
satire,  and  worldly  wisdom,  than  is  condensed  in  this 
small  volume.  Mingling  much  with  the  world,  Chamfort 
brought  into  it  a  spirit  of  observation  so  ingenious  and 
penetrating  that  the  shrewdest  and  most  sagacious  of  his 
contemporaries  deemed  him  almost  unerring  and  miracu 
lous  in  his  judgments.  Many  sayings  which  are  now  on 
everybody's  lips  first  fell  from  his  lips  or  pen.  It  was 
he  who  first  divided  our  friends  into  "those  who  love  us. 
those  who  are  indifferent  to  us,  and  those  who  hate  us." 


294  A   FORGOTTEN   WIT. 

It  was  he,  not  Talleyrand,  who  said,  "Revolutions  are 
not  made  with  rose-water."  It  was  he  who  gave  to  the 
French  armies,  as  they  marched  into  Belgium,  the  motto, 
"  War  to  the  castle;  peace  to  the  cottage."  It  was  Cham- 
fort,  too,  that  furnished  the  Abbe*-Sie*yes  with  the  memora 
ble  closing  words  of  his  pamphlet:  "  What  is  the  Third 
Estate?  All.  What  has  it?  Nothing."  Chamfort  was 
accustomed  to  write  out  daily,  on  little  bits  of  paper,  the 
results  of  his  observations  and  reflections  condensed  into 
maxims;  and  these  mots,  carefully  polished  and  sharpened, 
with  the  anecdotes  he  had  picked  up  in  the  great  world 
among  professional  men,  artists,  and  men  of  letters,  form 
the  most  brilliant  and  attractive  part  of  his  writings. 
The  following,  selected  almost  at  random,  are  fair  speci 
mens  of  the  whole: 

"The  public,  the  public,  how  many  fools  does  it  take  to  make  a 
public?" 

"  The  menace  of  a  neglected  cold  is  for  the  doctors  that  which  purga 
tory  is  for  the  priests, —  a  mine  of  wealth." 

"'You  yawn,'  said  a  lady  to  her  husband.  'My  dear  friend,'  said  the 
husband,  '  husband  and  wife  are  but  one,  and  when  I  am  alone  I  become 
weary.' " 

"To  despise  money  is  to  dethrone  a  king;  il  y  a  du  ragout." 

"The  majority  of  nobles  recall  their  ancestors  pretty  much  as  an  Italian 
cicerone  recalls  Cicero." 

"  Madame  de  Tencin,  with  the  suavest  manners  in  the  world,  was  an 
unprincipled  woman,  capable  of  anything.  On  one  occasion,  a  friend  was 
praising  her  gentleness.  'Aye,  aye,'  said  the  Abbe  Imblet,  'if  she  had  any 
object  whatever  in  poisoning  you,  undoubtedly  she  would  choose  the  sweetest 
and  least  disagreeable  poison  in  the  world.'" 

"  I  heard  one  day  a  devotee,  speaking  against  people  who  discuss  articles 
of  faith,  say  naivement;  '  Gentlemen,  a  true  Christian  never  examines  what 
he  is  ordered  to  believe.  It  is  with  that  as  with  a  bitter  pi-ll ;  if  you  chew  it, 
you  will  never  be  able  to  swallow  it.' " 

"  The  most  utterly  lost  of  all  days  is  that  on  which  you  have  not  once 
laughed." 

"Society  is  composed  of  two  great  classes,— those  who  have  more  din 
ners  than  apoetitrs,  and  those  who  have  more  appetites  than  dinners." 


A  FORGOTTEN   WIT.  295 

"Madame  de  Talmont,  seeing  M.  de  Richelieu,  instead  of  lavishing  atten 
tion  on  herself,  paying  court  to  Madame  Brionne,  a  very  pretty  woman  with 
out  the  least  mind,  said  to  him,  'Marshal,  you  are  not  blind,  but  I  believe 
you  are  a  little  deaf.' " 

"A  lady,  who  shall  be  nameless,  was  at  the  representation  of  'Merope, 
and  did  not  shed  a  tear.  Everybody  was  surprised;  perceiving  which  the 
lady  said,  'I  could  indeed  have  wept,  but  I  am  engaged  out  to-night  to 
supper.' " 

"L'Eclure  used  to  relate,  that,  when  quite  a  young  man,  and  without  » 
fortune,  arriving  at  Luneville,  he  obtained  the  place  of  dentist  to  King  Stan' 
islaus  on  the  very  day  on  which  the  king  lost  his  last  tooth." 

"A  lady  aged  ninety  said  to  Fontenelle,  at  ninety-five:  'Death  has  for 
gotten  us.'  'Silence!  not  a  word!'  said  Fontenelle,  placing  his  finger  upon 
his  mouth." 

"A  person  chided  M."  (Chamfort  himself)  "upon  his  taste  for  solitude. 
He  replied:  'It  is  because  I  am  more  accustomed  to  my  own  faults  than 
to  those  of  another  person.' " 

"Man  arrives  a  novice  at  every  age  of  life." 

"  Nature,  in  loading  us  with  so  much  misery,  and  in  giving  us  an  invin 
cible  attachment  to  life,  seems  to  have  dealt  with  man  like  an  incendiary  who 
sets  our  house  on  fire  after  having  posted  sentinels  at  our  door.  The  danger 
must  be  very  great  to  oblige  us  to  leap  out  of  the  window." 

"M.  de  Lassay,  a  very  pleasant  man,  but  who  had  a  great  knowledge  of 
society,  said  that  it  would  be  necessary  to  swallow  a  toad  every  morning,  in 
order  not  to  find  anything  disgusting  the  rest  of  the  day,  when  one  has  to 
spend  it  in  the  world." 

"  A  certain  person,  who  shall  be  nameless,  had  been,  for  thirty  years,  in 
the  habit  of  passing  his  evenings  at  Madame  II's.  At  length  his  wife  died. 
People  thought  he  would  marry  the  lady  whose  house  he  frequented,  and  his 
best  friends  encouraged  him  to  perpetrate  the  deed.  He  refused,  saying,  "  In 
that  case,  my  friends,  where  should  I  find  a  house  of  refuge  to  pass  my  even 
ings?" 

"  People  give  ten-guinea  dinners  to  entertain  those  for  whose  good  diges 
tion  of  the  expensive  dinner  they  would  not  give  a  groat." 

"  France  is  a  country  in  which  it  is  always  necessary  to  display  one's  vices, 
and  always  dangerous  to  disclose  one's  virtues." 

These  sayings,  so  acrid  and  corrosive,  are  a  fair  speci 
men  of  what  a  witty  French  writer  has  called  les  tenailles 
mordantes  de  Chamfort.  The  majority  of  those  relating 
to  society  apply  only  to  the  great  world  in  which  he 
lived,  the  society  of  the  great;  they  wholly  fail  to  char 
acterize  the  less  factitious  society  in  which  the  natural 


296  A   FORGOTTEK   WIT. 

sentiments  are  not  abolished.  It  was  because  he  lived 
too  long  in  high  life,  that  theatre  of  unequal  struggles, 
of  trickery,  and  of  vanity, —  because  he  passed  too  many 
years  in  refined  society,  and  saw  its  hollowness,  selfish 
ness  and  dissimulation, —  that  he  has  given  us  so  many 
pictures  of  hypocrisy  and  insincerity,  and  was  able  to 
utter  his  famous  saying:  "I  have  been  led  there  by  de 
grees.  In  living  and  in  seeing  men,  the  heart  must  break 
or  be  bronzed  (se  brise  ou  se  bronze}.  Chamfort  had  one  of 
those  unfortunate  natures,  which,  ignorant  of  the  happy 
alchemy  which  converts  even  gall  and  wormwood  into 
honey,  find  bitterness  in  everything,  and  echo  the  senti 
ment  of  the  poet, — 

"  La  rose  a  des  poisons  qu'on  finit  par  trouver." 

He  confesses,  however,  to  have  had  in  his  life  two 
years  of  happiness,  and  six  months  of  perfect  felicity. 
He  had  retired  to  the  country  with  a  female  friend 
older  than  himself,  but  with  whom  he  felt  himself  in 
perfect  sympathy  of  sentiment  and  of  thought.  He  lost 
her,  and  appears  to  have  buried  with  her  the  remains  of 
his  heart.  He  never  speaks  of  her  but  in  terms  that 
mark  a  profound  sadness: 

u  When  my  heart  has  need  of  tenderness,  I  recall  the  friends  whom  I  have 
lost,  women  of  whom  death  has  robbed  me.  I  inhabit  their  grave;  I  send  my 
soul  to  wander  about  theirs.  Alas!  I  have  three  tombs." 

In  estimating  many  of  his  maxims  we  must  not  forget 
that  they  come  from  a  man  who  never  had  a  family,  who 
was  not  softened  by  its  endearments,  ni  en  remontant  ni 
en  descendant,  who  had  no  father,  and  who,  in  his  turn, 
never  wished  to  be  one.  "Consulting  reason  only."  he 
again  and  again  asks,  "  what  man  would  wish  to  be  a 
father?"  "I  will  not  marry,"  he  says  again,  "for  fear 


A   FORGOTTEN  WIT.  297 

of  having  a  son  to  resemble  me.  Yes,  for  fear  of  having 
a  son  who,  being  poor  like  myself,  may  know  not  how  to 
lie,  or  to  flatter,  or  to  creep,  and  may  have  to  undergo 
the  same  trials  as  myself." 

Chamfort  did  nothing  continuously;  he  has  left  no 
book  as  a  monument  of  his  powers.  He  left  others  to 
execute  important  enterprises,  and  was  content  to  supply 
the  stimulus.  His  forte,  his  genius,  lay  in  summing  up  a 
situation,  a  counsel,  a  general  impression,  in  a  single  word. 
His  influence  upon  French  society  was  unquestionable, 
but  it  was  exercised  wholly  in  conversation,  in  sallies  of 
wit,  in  those  sparkling  sayings  "  which  make  one  (a  thing 
so  rare)  laugh  and  think  at  the  same  time."  It  is  in 
the  Maximes  et  Pensees,  which  form  the  latter  half  of 
Houssaye's  edition  of  his  remains,  that  we  must  look  for 
the  quintessence  of  this  piquant  and  spirituel  writer. 
Whether  he  deserves  a  literary  resurrection,  the  reader 
can  judge.  That  his  genius  was  quite  as  original  and 
brilliant  as  that  of  many  an  author  whom  the  world  does 
"not  willingly  let  die,"  we  think  is  clear.  That  he  was 
especially  a.  keen  observer  of  men,  the  volume  we  have 
quoted  from  abundantly  proves.  The  court,  the  camp,  the 
city,  the  exchange,  the  theatres,  the  churches, —  all  the 
classes,  ranks,  and  conditions  of  society, —  pass  in  review 
in  his  pictured  pages,  and  reveal  themselves  to  us  "in 
their  habit  as  they  lived." 

Will  it  be  said  that  he  was  cynical, —  that  his  wit 
was  dry,  caustic,  and  sardonic?  So  was  Swift's  and 
Rochefoucauld's.  Are  there  occasional  passages  in  his 
writings  that  one  would  not  like  to  read  aloud?  Yes; 
but  are  there  not  more  such  in  Shakspeare,  Sterne,  Pope, 
and  Montaigne?  That  Chamfort  would  have  produced 


298  A    FORGOTTEN    WIT. 

works  more  worthy  of  his  genius  if  his  energies  had  not 
been  drained  by  the  exhausting  labors  of  journalism,  we 
cannot  doubt.  We  all  know  the  effects  of  these  labors, 
when  ceaseless  and  engrossing,  upon  even  the  most  lav 
ishly-endowed  writer.  He  becomes  at  last  a  hack  thinker 
and  a  loose  writer;  he  is  a  race-horse  in  the  shafts  of 
an  omnibus,  Aaron's  beard  never  would  have  come  down 
to  us  in  history,  had  he  been  in  the  habit  of  shaving 
daily;  and  had  Montaigne  and  Pascal  lived  in  our  day, 
the  immortal  "  Essays "  might  have  dwindled  into  a 
Moniteur  correspondence,  and  the  "Provincial  Letters" 
might  have  been  let  off  in  squibs  to  fizz  and  sparkle 
through  fifty-two  weeks  in  Charivari.  Granting  all  that 
can  be  said  in  disparagement  of  Chamfort, —  that  he  was 
sour  and  misanthropical;  that  his  genius  had  little  flow; 
that  his  wit  was  disproportionate  to  his  other  gifts;  that 
he  lacked  that  highest  wisdom  which  only  goodness  can 
give,  and  was  blunt  and  vehement  where  a  milder  and 
more  courteous  expression  of  his  opinions  would  have 
better  insured  their  reception, —  we  still  think  his  works 
should  be  kept  from  the  "  moth  and  worm,  and  mouldering 
hand  of  time."  We  believe  with  Sainte-Beuve,  that,  in 
spite  of  his  faults,  Chamfort  will  continue  to  be  classed  in 
the  front  rank  of  those  who  have  managed  la  saillie  fran- 
paise  with  the  most  dexterity  and  boldness.  Too  sickly  and 
too  irritable  to  deserve  ever  to  obtain  a  place  in  the 
series  of  true  moralists,  his  name  will  remain  attached  to 
a  number  of  concise,  sharp,  vibrating,  and  picturesque 
sayings,  which  pique  the  attention,  and  which  fix  them 
selves  like  barbed  arrows  in  the  memory.  At  the  same 
time,  however,  we  would  say  to  all  his  readers,  in  the 
words  of  the  same  critic:  "  Me*fiez-vous,  pourtant!  je  crains 
qu'il  n'y  ait  toujours  un  peu  d'arsenic  au  fond." 


ABE  WE  ANGLO-SAXON? 


"  "A  yf~Y  children,1'  Dr.  Johnson  used  to  say  to  his  friends, 
JJLL.  n  deliver  yourselves  from  cant."  Every  age  has 
its  cant,  which,  in  some  of  the  thousand  forms  of  the  thing, 
is  the  prevailing  rage.  That  of  our  own  time  is  Anglo- 
Saxon  glorification.  Not  a  day  passes,  but  we  read  in 
print,  or  hear  from  the  platform,  the  eternal,  hackneyed 
boasting  about  our  "manifest  destiny," — the  same  weari 
some  ding-dong  about  the  Anglo-Saxon  energy,  and  the 
rapidity  with  which  the  race  is  belting  the  globe,  and 
supplanting  the  laws,  manners,  and  customs  of  every 
other  people.  This  cant  has  been  echoed  and  re-echoed, 
—  in  newspaper  articles,  stump  speeches,  Congressional 
harangues,  and  even  in  works  on  ethnology, —  till  it  has 
become  a  nuisance.  We  are  as  sick  of  it  as  ever  Dr. 
Johnson  was  of  the  everlasting  "  Second  Punic  War." 
"Who  will  deliver  me  from  the  Greeks  and  Romans?" 
cried  in  agony  the  classic- ridden  Frenchman.  "  Who  will 
deliver  us  from  the  Anglo-Saxon?"  despairingly  cry  we. 
There  are  in  the  United  States  some  six  or  eight 
millions  of  people  who  are  descended  from  the  Anglo- 
Saxons, —  and  that  is  probably  all.  That  population  is  to 
be  found  principally  in  New  England,  side  by  side  with 
men  of  every  clime  and  land;  not  a  very  stupendous 
item,  is  it,  out  of  some  forty-two  millions  of  men,  women, 
and  children,  who  think  and  toil  between  the  St.  Croix 
Eiver  and  the  Bay  of  San  Francisco?  True,  these  forty- 

299 


BOO  ARE   WE   ANGLO-SAXON? 

two  millions  all,  or  nine-tenths  of  them,  speak  the 
language  of  Shakspeare  and  Bacon;  but  this  no  more 
proves  them  the  descendants  of  that  race  which  was  first 
whipped  by  a  few  Scandinavian  filibusters,  and  afterward 
thrashed,  held  by  the  throats,  and  ruled  with  a  rod  of 
iron  when  they  complained,  for  century  after  century,  by  a 
handful  of  Normans,  than  the  wearing  of  woolen  proves  a 
man  a  sheep,  or  drinking  lager  beer  proves  him  a  Dutch 
man. 

Who  are  the  men  who  have  built  up  this  nation  and 
made  it  the  great  republic  it  is?  Are  they  all,  or  nearly 
all,  of  Anglo-Saxon  birth  or  descent?  Not  to  speak  of 
the  Swiss,  the  Huguenots,  the  Dutch,  and  other  minor 
peoples,  let  us  look  at  the  Irish  contingent  to  American 
greatness.  From  the  very  first  settlement  of  the  country, 
in  field  and  street,  at  the  plow,  in  the  Senate,  and  on 
the  battle-field,  Irish  energy  was  represented.  Maryland 
and  South  Carolina  were  largely  peopled  by  Hibernians. 
Maine,  New  Hampshire,  and  Kentucky  received  many 
Irish  emigrants.  During  the  first  half  of  the  last  cen 
tury,  the  emigration  from  Ireland  to  this  country  was 
not  less  than  a  quarter  of  a  million.  When  our  fore 
fathers  threw  off  the  British  yoke,  the  Irish  formed  a 
sixth  or  seventh  of  the  whole  population,  and  one- fourth 
of  all  the  commissioned  officers  in  the  army  and  navy 
were  of  Irish  descent.  The  first  general  officer  killed  in 
battle,  the  first  officer  of  artillery  appointed,  the  first 
Commodore  commissioned,  the  first  victor  to  whom  the 
British  flag  was  struck  at  sea,  and  the  first  officer  who 
surprised  a  fort  by  land,  were  Irishmen;  and  with  such 
enthusiasm  did  the  emigrants  from  "  the  Green  Isle " 
espouse  the  cause  of  liberty,  that  Lord  Mountjoy  declared 


ARE   WE    ANGLO-SAXON"?  301 

in  Parliament,  "You  lost  America  by  the  Irish."  We 
will  not  speak  of  the  physical  development  of  America, 
to  which  two  generations  of  Irish  laborers  have  chiefly 
contributed,  but  for  the  constant  supply  of  which  the 
buft'alo  might  still  be  browsing  in  the  Genesee  Valley, 
and  "  Forty-second  street "  be  "  out  of  town "  (speaking 
Hibernice)  in  New  York;  we  will  confine  ourselves  to  the 
men  of  brain  who  have  leavened  the  mass  of  bone  and 
sinew  by  which  our  material  prosperity  has  been  worked 
out.  Who  were  the  Carrolls,  the  Rutledges,  the  Fitzsim- 
mons,  and  the  McKeans,  of  the  Revolution?  —  whence 
came  Andrew  Jackson,  Robert  Emmet,  J.  C.  Calhoun,  and 
McDuffie,  of  a  later  day?  —  whence  the  projector  of  the 
Erie  Canal,  the  inventor  of  the  first  steamboat,  and  the 
builder  of  the  first  American  railroad?  —  whence  two  of 
our  leading  sculptors,  Powers  and  Crawford?  —  whence 
our  most  distinguished  political  economist,  Carey?  — 
whence  the  Hero  of  Winchester,  whom  all  the  people  of 
the  North  have  delighted  to  honor?  They  were  all  Irish 
by  birth  or  descent. 

Even  to  the  Welsh  element  in  our  population,  our 
country  is  indebted  in  no  small  degree  for  its  prosperity. 
Of  the  signers  of  the  Declaration  of  Independence,  eighteen 
had  Welsh  blood  in  their  veins,  and  among  them  were 
Samuel  Adams,  John  Adams,  Stephen  Hopkins,  Francis 
Hopkinson,  Robert  Morris.  B.  Gwinnett,  Thomas  Jefferson, 
Benjamin  Harrison,  Richard  H.  Lee,  and  Francis  H.  Lee. 
Among  our  Revolutionary  Generals,  the  brave  Montgom 
ery,  who  fell  at  Quebec,  "  Mad  "  Anthony  Wayne,  the  fiery 
Ethan  Allen,  and  David  Morgan,  together  with  Charles 
Lee,  John  Cadwallader,  and  many  others,  were  of  Welsh 
blood;  and  so  were  six  of  our  Presidents,  viz.:  John 


302  ARE    WE   ANGLO-SAXON? 

Adams,  Jefferson,  Monroe,  J.  Q.  Adams,  Harrison,  and 
Buchanan.  We  may  add  that  President  Grant,  to  whom 
the  Republic  is  indebted  more  than  to  any  other  man  since 
Washington,  is  not  of  Anglo-Saxon  descent,  but  of  Nor 
man,  via  Scotland. 

If,  leaving  history,  we  look  to  the  moral  and  physio 
logical  traits  of  the  American  people,  we  shall  find  them 
clearly  distinguished  from  those  of  the  Anglo-Saxons.  The 
English  people  and  the  American  differ  widely  in  mind, 
feeling,  temper,  and  manners;  and  these  differences  may  be 
traced  to  the  characteristics  of  nations  who  have  mingled 
the  stream  of  their  life  with  the  current  derived  from  Eng 
land.  We  have  far  quicker  sensibilities  than  the  English, 
both  of  affection  and  of  wrath,  being  kindlier  in  our  gentle 
mood,  and  more  fiery  when  irritated.  Along  with  this 
inflammable  temper,  we  have  an  originality  of  invention, 
a  discursiveness  of  inquiry,  a  keen  quest  of  novelty,  a 
fertility  of  expedients,  a  contempt  for  antiquated  laws, 
customs,  and  precedents,  which  strikingly  contrast  with 
the  timidity  and  caution,  the  conservative  and  creeping 
policy  of  the  English. 

How  we  came  to  be  infected  by  the  Anglo-Saxon 
mania,  it  would  be  hard  to  tell.  Even  in  England  it  is 
ridiculous  enough ;  but  there  it  is  beginning  to  be  laughed 
at  by  men  of  sense,  who  perceive  the  absurdity  of  English 
men  claiming  to  be  Anglo-Saxons,  when  there  is  no  such 
race  in  existence,  and  never  was.  Those  who  echo  this 
boast,  should  read  Defoe's  "  True-born  Englishman,"  in 
which,  at  a  time  when  it  was  customary  to  denounce 
King  William  as  "  a  foreigner,"  the  author  was  at  pains 
to  instruct  his  countrymen  how  many  mongrel  races  had 
conspired  to  form  "that  vain,  ill-natured  thing,  an  Eng- 


ARE   WE   ANGLO-SAXON?  303 

lishman,"  and  showed  in  limping  verse,  but  unanswerable 

logic,  that 

UA  True-born  Englishman's  a  contradiction  — 
In  speech  an  irony,  in  fact  a  fiction; 
A  metaphor  invented  to  express 
A  man  AKIN  to  all  the  universe." 

Anything  more  motley  and  heterogeneous  than  the 
Anglo-Saxon  blood,  even  before  the  Norman  invasion, 
made  up,  as  it  was,  from  the  veins  of  Britons,  Eomans, 
Saxons,  Picts,  Scots,  and  Danes,  it  would  be  hard  to  con 
ceive.  It  began  with  the  Celtic,  of  which  it  is  a  dilution, 
—  that  very  Celtic  with  which  certain  writers  are  fond 
of  telling  us  it  is  in  deadly  antagonism  and  enmity;  next 
comes  the  Roman  blood, —  a  blood  shared,  more  or  less, 
by  every  people  in  Southern  and  Western  Europe,  to  say 
nothing  of  parts  of  Asia  and  Africa, —  and  which,  we 
know,  was  derived  from  a  mingling  together  of  all  the 
races  of  ancient  Italy  and  the  ancient  world;  and  then 
follows  the  blood  of  the  Picts  and  Scots,  the  Jutes,  Frisians, 
Angles,  and  Saxons,  the  Danes,  and,  last  of  all,  the  Normans, 
who,  as  Dr.  Latham  says,  were,  from  first  to  last,  Celtic 
on  the  mother's  side,  and  on  that  of  the  father,  Celtic, 
Roman,  and  German,  and  hence  brought  over  to  England 
only  the  elements  they  had  before, —  Celtic,  Roman,  German, 
and  Norse.  All  this  shows  plainly  that  the  idea  of  an 
Anglo-Saxon  race,  composed  of  pure  Anglian  and  Saxon 
elements,  is  sheer  nonsense.  It  shows  that  the  English 
Anglo-Saxon  race  is  composed  of  the  same  constituents 
as  the  other  leading  European  races,  not  excepting  the 
French;  and  that  hence  it  is  simply  absurd  for  Americans 
to  call  themselves  Anglo-Saxons,  when  they  have  con 
founded,  and  are  daily  more  and  more  confounding,  the 
confusion  of  the  English  blood  by  infusions  from  the 
veins  of  all  the  other  nations  of  Europe. 


304  ARE   WE   ANGLO-SAXON? 

The  truth  is,  that,  made  up  as  we  are,  of  so  many 
nationalities,  "  pigging  together,  heads  and  points,,  in  one 
truckle-bed,"  we  are  as  mixed,  piebald,  and  higgledy- 
piggledy  a  race  as  the  sun  ever  looked  down  upon.  Com 
pared  with  us,  the  Romans,  who  first  comprised  all  the 
vagabonds  of  Italy,  and  finally  incorporated  into  the 
empire  all  the  semi-barbarians  of  Europe,  were  a  homo 
geneous  race.  To  plume  ourselves  upon  our  Anglo- 
Saxon  extraction,  is  as  ridiculous  as  the  inordinate  pride 
of  ancestry  rebuked  by  Defoe,  which  led  the  self-styled 
"  True-born  Englishmen "  of  his  day  to  sneer  at  •  the 
Dutch: 

"  Forgetting  that  themselves  are  all  derived 
From  the  most  scoundrel  race  that  ever  lived. 
A  horrid  crowd  of  rambling  thieves  and  drones, 
Who  ransacked  kingdoms  and  dispeopled  towns; 
The  Pict  and  painted  Briton,  treacherous  Scot, 
By  hunger,  theft,  and  rapine  hither  brought; 
Norwegian  pirates,  buccaneering  Danes, 
Whose  red-haired  offspring  everywhere  remains; 
Who,  joined  with  Norman  French,  compound  the  breed, 
From  whence  your  '  True-born  Englishmen  '  proceed." 

When  we  think  how  much  we,  in  common  with  the 
English  people,  are  indebted  to  the  sturdy  old  Norman 
kings  and  barons  for  our  liberties,  we  have  still  less 
reason  for  joining  in  the  cant  of  Anglo-Saxonism.  Who 
was  it  that  established  in  England  the  right  of  trial  by 
jury;  that  commuted  personal  service  in  the  field  for  a 
fair  scutage;  that  taxed  nobles  and  commons  alike,  and 
struck  the  hardest  blows  at  the  tyranny  of  feudal  lords 
over  their  vassals  ?  Who ,  was  it  that  summoned  the  first 
English  House  of  Commons;  that  gave  England  her 
judicial  circuits;  that  opposed  the  stoutest  and  most 
effectual  resistance  to  the  encroachments  of  the  Koman 


ABE   WE  ANGLO-SAX01T?  305 

See?  In  each  case  it  was  a  Norman  King.  It  was  the 
Norman  Kings  who  first  forbade  appeals  to  Rome,  and 
denied  to  the  Papal  legates  permission  to  be  received  as 
such  within  the  realm;  and  it  was  the  sturdy  Norman 
barons  who,  when  John  Lackland  stooped  to  resign  his 
crown  and  kingdom  into  the  hands  of  a  Papal  legate,  and 
to  receive  it  back  as  a  Papal  fief,  rose  against  the  cow 
ard,  and  forced  the  signing  of  Magna  Charta.  If  we 
are  proud  of  our  descent  from  the  Saxons,  let  us  not 
forget  that  we  have  also  the  blood  of  the  old  Scandi 
navian  vikings  in  our  veins,  and  that  but  for  this  infusion 
of  Norse  fire  into  their  cold  Saxon  nature,  the  nation 
from  which  we  have  derived  our  political  and  religious 
liberties,  might  have  bequeathed  to  us  the  same  institu 
tions  that  prevail  on  the  Continent  of  Europe. 

Out,  then,  upon  this  stereotyped  laudation  of  the 
Anglo-Saxon  race  and  its  progress!  There  is  nothing 
more  dangerous  to  our  political  unity  than  this  miserable 
cant  about  "  races,"  and  especially  this  gabble  about 
Anglo-Saxon  blood,  which  we  .hear  so  often  in  the  United 
States.  It  is  just  such  talk  as  this  which  has  caused 
many  civil  wars  in  Europe, —  which  in  1848  set  the  Ger 
mans  and  the  different  Slavic  races  to  cutting  each 
other's  throats;  and  it  has  led  to  similar  horrors  in  our 
own  country.  It  has  already  roused  the  jealousy  of  our 
South  American  neighbors,  whom  our  demagogues  are  so 
fond  of  teaching  us  to  regard  as  an  inferior  race,  and 
therefore  doomed  to  be  our  prey, —  the  victims  of  our 
"manifest  destiny."  Those  Americans  who  join  in  these 
vauntings, —  proclaiming  that  we  are  a  great  people 
because  we  are  of  the  same  stock  as  the  English, —  forget 
that  thie  self- stultification  is  anything  but  creditable  to 


306  ABE   WE   ANGLO-SAXON  ? 

them ;  that  it  detracts  from  rather  than  adds  to  the  dignity 
of  the  American  character.  Instead  of  blushing  or  hang 
ing  down  our  heads  on  account  of  our  mixed  origin,  we 
should  be  proud  of  it,  for  all  history,  ancient  and  modern, 
shows  that  it  is  by  the  fusion  of  race  that  all  great  and 
vigorous  new  races  are  made.  All  the  powerful  nations 
of  Europe  have  been  reconstituted, —  made  anew, —  in  this 
way,  and  those  are  the  weakest  which  have  received  the 
least  stimulus  of  admixture.  "  The  purest  populations  of 
Europe,"  says  that  distinguished  ethnologist,  Dr.  Latham, 
"  are  the  Basques,  the  Lapps,  Tie  Poles,  and  the  Frisians," 
—  confessedly  among  the  weakest  and  most  insignificant 
tribes  of  Europe;  and  he  adds  that  "the  most  powerful 
nations  are  the  most  heterogeneous."  The  British  are  in 
many  respects  the  most  powerful  people  of  Europe,  and 
they  are  also  the  most  heterogeneous.  We  are  still  more 
mixed,  and  every  day  blends  new  elements  with  our  blood, 
making  our  pedigree  more  and  more  a  puzzle.  Consider 
ing  how  much  Celtic,  Scandinavian,  and  other  blood  runs 
in  our  veins,  this  Anglo-Saxon  glorification  in  our  repub 
lic  is  peculiarly  invidious,  exasperating,  and  misplaced. 
America  is  not  Anglo-Saxon  any  more  than  it  is  Norman 
or  Celtic;  it  is  the  grand  asylum  and  home  of  humanity, 
where  people  of  every  race  and  clime  under  the  whole 
Heaven  may  stand  erect  on  one  unvarying  plane  of 
political  and  religious  equality, —  feel  that,  despite  "the 
lack  of  titles,  power  and  pelf,"  they  are  men  "  for  a' 
that," — and  bless  Heaven  that  they  have  work  to  do, 
food  to  eat,  books  to  read,  and  the  privilege  of  worship 
ping  God  according  to  the  dictates  of  their  own  consciences. 
Such  may  it  ever  remain!  . 


A  DAY  AT  OXFORD. 


AMONG  the  thousand  interesting  places  which  the 
-£JL_  American  traveler  may  visit  in  Europe,  there  are 
none  which  have  a  greater  charm  for  the  scholar  than  the 
two  university  towns  of  England,  Oxford  and  Cambridge. 
Whatever  the  architectural  beauties  or  the  historic  glories 
he  finds  in  the  Continental  towns,  there  is  no  one  in 
which  he  lingers  so  long  and  lovingly,  no  one  from  which 
he  at  last  tears  himself  away  with  such  a  pang  of  reluc 
tance,  as  from  these  ancient  seats  of  learning.  It  is  now 
five  years  since  we  first  enjoyed  the  intense  pleasure  of 
treading  the  quadrangles,  the  gardens  and  the  halls  of 
the  two  universities;  and  though  we  have  since  visited 
many  other  places  of  world-renowned  beauty,  and  hal 
lowed  by  historic  memories,  yet  there  is  no  one  the  men 
tion  of  which  conjures  up  so  many  pleasant  recollections 
of  hours  too  quickly  passed, —  hours  in  which  eye  and  ear, 
mind  and  soul,  were  intoxicated  with  delight, —  as  do  the 
names  of  these  famous  towns.  To  which  of  these  haunts 
of  learning  the  palm  of  beauty  is  to  be  given,  it  is  as  hard 
as  it  would  be  invidious  to  say.  Neither  has  its  parallel 
elsewhere  in  the  world.  There  is  something  absolutely 
unapproachable  in  the  scenes  that  greet  the  eye  behind 
the  colleges  at  Cambridge,  where  the  Cam  steals  along 
between  frequent  arches,  and  groves,  and  lawns,  and  be 
neath  the  shadows  of  venerable  edifices;  there  is  no  other 
quadrangle  in  the  world  like  the  great  quadrangle  of 

307 


308  A    DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

Trinity;  nor  can  Oxford  boast  of  any  chapel  equal  to  that 
of  King's  College,  with  its  huge  buttresses,  its  immense 
windows,  its  profusion  of  exquisite  carvings,  and  quaint 
fret- work,  and  above  all,  its  wondrous  stone  roof, 

"Self-poised  and  scooped  into  ten  thousand  cells, 
Where  light  and  shade  repose,  where  music  dwells, 
Lingering,— and  wandering  as  loth  to  die; 
Like  thoughts  whose  very  sweetness  yieldeth  proof 
That  they  were  born  for  immortality." 

Yet  the  view  of  Oxford,  with  its  multiplicity  of  tur 
rets,  pinnacles,  and  towers,  rising  in  the  bosom  of  a 
beautiful  valley,  amid  waters  and  gardens,  fully  merits 
Wordsworth's  epithet  of  "overpowering;11  and  he  who 
can  look  upon  this  "  City  of  Palaces,1'  hoary  with  ancestral 
honors,  and  rich  in  treasures  of  bibliography,  science,  and 
art,  and  not  exclaim  with  the  poet, 

"  Robed  in  the  grandeur  of  thy  waving  woods, 
Girt  with  a  silver  zone  of  winding  floods, 
Fair  art  thou,  Oxford!  " 

must  be  as  dull  as  the  clod  he  treads  upon.  It  was  an 
excusable  burst  of  enthusiasm  in  Robert  Hall,  when, 
standing  on  the  summit  of  the  RadclifFe  Library,  he  was 
so  impressed  with  the  beauty  of  the  scene, —  the  dark  and 
ancient  edifices,  clustering  together  in  forms  full  of  rich 
ness  and  beauty, —  the  quadrangles,  gardens,  and  groves, 
—  the  flowing  rivers  and  belting  hills,  wood-crowned, — 
and,  over  all,  the  clear,  blue-flecked  sky, —  that  he  cried 
out,  "  Sir,  sir,  it  is  surely  the  New  Jerusalem  come  down 
from  Heaven!" 

It  is,  of  course,  impossible,  within  the  limits  of  a  brief 
essay,  to  speak  of  a  tithe  of  the  interesting  things  one 
may  see  in  even  a  day's  visit  to  a  city  like  Oxford  or 
Cambridge.  The  name  Oxford  is  derived  from  the  "  Ox- 


A   DAY   AT   OXFORD.  309 

fords"  about  the  city,  the  particular  ford  being  at  Binsey 
or  North  Hincksey.  The  city  is  of  great  antiquity,  and 
from  an  early  period  was  one  of  considerable  importance, 
Nearly  every  British  sovereign  has  visited  it,  some  have 
lived  in  it,  and  Parliament  has  assembled  in  it  on  twenty 
different  occasions.  The  zealous  antiquaries  of  the  town 
have  even  claimed  that  the  first  English  printing-press  was 
set  up  in  Oxford,  Corsellis  having  printed  a  book  there  in 
1468,  four  years  before  Caxton  set  up  a  press  at  West 
minster.  It  is  much  more  certain  that  the  first  British 
martyrs,  that  suffered  for  renouncing  the  Roman  Catholic 
faith,  were  Oxford  men.  Thirty  Baptists  of  this  city  were 
punished  for  heresy,  in  the  time  of  Henry  II,  by  starva 
tion  without  the  walls.  The  University  consists  of  twenty 
Colleges  and  five  Halls,  or  unendowed  societies.  The  oldest 
(University)  is  said  to  date  back  to  886 ;  the  latest  (Keble) 
was  founded  in  1868.  The  entrances  to  the  town  are  all 
more  or  less  picturesque,  except  that  from  the  railway  sta 
tion,  and  three  of  them  cross  those  beautiful  meandering 
streams  which  the  Oxonians  dignify  with  the  names  of 
rivers, —  the  Thames  (here  called  the  "Isis")  and  the 
"  Cherwell."  In  the  good  old  days,  before  the  scream  of 
the  locomotive  was  heard  in  this  charming  valley,  the 
visitor,  from  whatever  direction  he  came,  got  from  the 
top  of  the  stage-coach  a  glorious  view  of  the  city.  The 
one  that  bursts  upon  you  from  the  Abingdon  road,  espe 
cially,  is  of  such  ineffable  beauty  that  it  must  quicken 
the  pulse  of  the  veriest  dunce.  It  is  one  of  those  rare 
sights  that  always  fill  a  painter's  heart  with  delight,  and 
might  be  put  at  once  on  canvas  without  the  change  of  a 
feature.  We,  of  course,  came  by  rail,  and,  entering  the 
town  from  the  west,  felt  little  throbbing  of  the  heart  till 


310  A    DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

we  reached  "  the  heart  of  its  mystery."  Strolling  along 
with  no  guide  but  our  Murray,  we  passed  the  Castle, 
built  in  William  Rufus's  time,  now  used  as  a  gaol,  and 
soon  found  ourselves  in  High  street,  where  the  genius  loci 
at  once  seized  upon  us,  and  we  realized  that  we  were 
standing  in  the  intellectual  birth-place  of  Hooker,  Hamp- 
den,  Wyckliffe,  and  many  another 

"  Giant  of  mighty  bone  and  high  emprise," 

of  whose  victories  not  only  Englishmen,  but  Americans, 
are  proud. 

This  famous  street,  the  pride  of  Oxford,  at  once  charms 
the  stranger  by  its  beauty,  and  increasing  intimacy  only 
deepens  his  admiration.  The  citizens  of  Oxford  may  well 
be  pardoned  for  believing  that  it  has  few  rivals  in  the 
world.  It  is  certainly  a  noble  street,  being  eighty-five 
feet  in  width,  and  lined  with  buildings  of  the  most  im 
pressive  orders  of  architecture,  the  parallels  of  which  are 
to  be  found  nowhere  else  in  the  "  silver-coasted  isle." 
The  great  and  rich  variety  of  buildings, —  colleges  and 
churches  mingling  with  modern  shops  and  old-fashioned 
dwellings, —  and  the  remarkable  diversity  of  the  styles  in 
which  they  are  built,  are  brought,  by  the  gentle  curva 
ture  of  the  street,  into  the  most  pleasant  combination 
and  contrast  imaginable.  The  churches  of  St.  Mary-the- 
Virgin,  All  Saints',  and  St.  Martin,  together  with  the  Col 
leges  of  All  Souls',  University,  Queen's,  and  Magdalen's, 
present  a  coup  d'ml  of  the  rarest  beauty,  worth  almost 
a  trip  across  the  Atlantic  to  see.  Up  this  street  it  was 
that  went  the  sad  procession  of  students  to  the  Bible 
Auto-da-FJ  in  1527.  Carrying  each  his  Bible  and  a  fagot, 
they  marched  slowly  and  gloomily  to  Christ  Church,  thence 
to  the  place  where  the  sacred  books  were  thrown  into  the 


A    DAY   AT   OXFORD.  311 

flames.  Down  this  street  it  was  that  on  March  20,  1556, 
Cranmer  slowly  wended  his  weary  steps,  bowed  with  years 
and  trouble,  on  his  way  to  St.  Mary's  Church,  to  protest 
against  "the  great  thing  that  troubled  his  conscience," 
his  renunciation  of  his  Protestant  faith;  and  it  was  but 
a  stone's  throw  from  here  that,  with  Latimer  and  Ridley, 
he  received  his  "  baptism  of  fire."  The  waist-shackle  of 
Cranmer  is  still  preserved,  and  the  bailiff's  account  for 
burning  him,  which  is  as  follows: 

One  hundred  wood  fagots £0  6  8 

One  hundred  and  fifty  furze  fagots 0  3  4 

Carriage  of  them 0  0  8 

Two  laborers 0  1  4 

£0  12~~0 

As  we  followed  "  the  stream-like  windings  of  that  glo 
rious  street,"  as  Wordsworth  terms  them,  evidences  that 
we  were  in  a  University- town  presented  themselves  on 
every  side.  Bookstores  abounded,  their  windows  filled 
with  classics  and  rare  old  tomes;  and  in  other  shops 
were  exposed  for  sale  gowns,  surplices,  academical  caps, 
and  the  colored  silken  hoods  that  denote  the  various  de 
grees  of  University  rank.  At  every  step  we  encountered 
persons  in  the  costume  worn  by  the  President  of  Harvard 
College  at  Commencement,  and  which,  a  few  years  ago, 
when  worn  occasionally  by  undergraduates,  provoked  the 
biting  ridicule  of  the  Boston  butcher-boys  and  truckmen. 

The  richest  and  most  extensive  of  all  the  Oxford  col 
leges  is  Christ  Church,  and  to  that  we  took  our  way. 
This  superb  structure,  "  at  once  a  Cathedral  and  a  Col 
lege,"  owes  its  foundation  to  the  "  King- Cardinal "  Wol- 
sey,  who  felt  so  deep  an  anxiety  about  its  completion 
that,  in  the  midst  of  his  trials,  he  earnestly  begged  the 


312  A      DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

King  to  let  the  work  go  on.  To  this  college  and  to 
Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  resort  all  the  princes  and 
nobles  of  Great  Britain  who  desire  a  liberal  education; 
and  from  this  foundation  have  gone  forth  a  long  line  of 
illustrious  statesmen,  who  have  found  no  superiors  in  the 
House  of  Commons  in  scholarship,  eloquence  or  ability. 
Four  great  religious  movements  have  had  their  origin  in 
this  establishment, — Wyckliffe's  in  the  fourteenth  cen 
tury,  James  the  Second's  in  the  seventeenth,  Wesley's 
and  Whitefield's  in  the  eighteenth,  and  Dr.  Pusey's  in 
the  nineteenth.  Nothing  can  be  more  imposing  than  the 
exterior  of  this  college;  its  long  front  of  four  hundred 
feet,  with  its  turrets  and  balustrades,  fill  the  mind  at 
once  with  ideas  of  amplitude,  magnificence  and  power. 
Through  the  grand  gateway,  above  which,  in  the  beauti 
ful  cupola  which  crowns  it,  hangs  the  bell,  "  Great  Tom," 
weighing  seventeen  thousand  pounds,  you  enter  the  larg 
est  quadrangle  (or  "  quad  ")  in  Oxford.  The  bell,  we  may 
say  in  passing,  originally  hung  in  Osney  Abbey  campa- 
nille,  "the  largest  and  loudest  of  Osney  bells";  and,  as 
Milton  wrote  his  "  II  Penseroso "  within  four  miles  of  Ox 
ford,  it  is  supposed  that  it  was  the  sound  of  "  Tom," 
borne  over  the  waters  in  time  of  flood,  that  he  had  in 
mind  when  he  wrote  the  famous  musical  lines, 

"Over  some  wide-watered  shore, 
Swinging  slow  with  sullen  roar." 

The  buildings  of  this,  as  of  all  the  colleges,  form  a 
square,  or  series  of  squares,  with  generally  a  green  lawn 
in  the  centre,  sometimes  a  reservoir  and  fountain;  here 
and  there  trees  are  planted,  and  sometimes  the  walls  are 
completely  covered  with  ivy.  After  a  few  admiring 
glances  at  the  "quads,"  we  visit  the  Hall,  a  magnificent 


A    DAY   AT   OXFORD.  313 

room,  among  the  finest  in  Europe.  It  is  one  hundred 
and  fifteen  feet  long  and  fifty  feet  high,  and  has  a  roof 
of  Irish  oak,  carved  and  decorated  in  the  most  elaborate 
manner,  and  adorned  with  nearly  three  hundred  armo 
rial  bearings  of  the  two  founders,  Cardinal  Wolsey  and 
Henry  VIII.  The  walls  on  both  sides  are  lined  with 
portraits  of  the  benefactors  of  the  college,  over  one  hun 
dred  in  number,  and  all  specimens  of  the  best  masters. 
Holbein,  Lely,  Vandyke,  Hogarth,  Raphael,  Reynolds,  and 
many  other  artists  hardly  less  celebrated,  have  contrib 
uted  to  the  riches  of  this  gallery.  Though  three  to  four 
centuries  old,  the  Hall  has  none  of  the  dust  or  decay  of 
age,  but  looks  as  fresh  and  bright  as  if  finished  but  yes 
terday.  Here  the  scholars  of  Christ  Church  dine;  the 
Peers,  Dean  and  Canons  occupying  the  raised  dais  at  the 
upper  end,  the  Masters  and  Bachelors  the  side- tables,  and 
the  undergraduates  the  lower  end  of  the  hall.  Here  Henry 
VIII,  Edward  VI,  James  I,  Charles  I,  and  other  English 
Kings  and  Queens,  have  been  entertained  with  plays,  de 
clamations,  and  banquets;  here  Handel,  the  great  composer, 
gave  concerts;  here,  in  June,  1814,  the  Allied  Sovereigns, 
with  Blucher,  Metternich,  and  a  host  of  other  celebrities, — 
nine  hundred  persons  in  all, —  sat  down  to  a  princely  feast. 
Besides  this  gallery  of  portraits  the  college  has  in  the 
Library  building  another  splendid  collection  of  paintings, 
chiefly  of  Italian  schools,  some  of  them  belonging  to  the 
oldest  periods  of  Italian  art.  The  library  is  a  beautiful 
apartment,  142  feet  by  30  feet,  and  37  high.  The  ceiling  is 
richly  ornamented  with  delicate  stucco  work,  and  the  wains- 
coat  and  pillars  are  of  the  finest  Norway  oak.  The  room 
is  full  of  literary  treasures  and  curiosities,  and  adorned 
with  antique  statues  and  busts.  If  the  visitor  has  time, 


314  A    DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

he  should  take  a  peep  into  the  kitchen,  and  see  a  good 
specimen  of  an  old  English  cooking-room.  Here  he  will 
see  a  huge  gridiron  moved  on  wheels,  4-J-  feet  long  by  4 
feet  wide,  used  before  the  introduction  of  spits  and  ranges, 
and  upon  which  a  whole  bullock  might  have  been  broiled 
as  easily  as  a  single  steak  at  one  of  the  ranges  of  these 
degenerate  days.  Leaving  this  unique  cuisine,  we  next 
proceed  to  the  magnificent  Cathedral,  now  the  chapel  of 
the  college,  but  originally  the  Priory  Church  of  St.  Frides- 
wide.  To  describe  fully  this  fine  building,  which  is  a 
cruciform  154  feet  in  length,  would  require  an  entire 
article.  The  beauty  of  the  choir,  with  the  massive  Saxon 
pillars  on  each  side,  and  the  double  arches  springing  from 
their  capitals,  through  the  air,  and  meeting  in  the  centre 
the  solid  arches  of  the  ceiling,  with  its  rich  pendants,  is 
such  as  to  baffle  description.  The  Cathedral  is  rich  in 
altar-tombs,  illuminated  windows,  and  monuments  of  rare 
workmanship  as  well  as  great  antiquity, —  among  which 
are  that  of  that  prodigy  of  out-of-the-way  learning, 
Robert  Burton,  the  author  of  "  The  Anatomy  of  Melan 
choly,"  and  that  of  Bishop  Berkeley,  the  metaphysician, 
whose  tombstone  is  inscribed  with  Pope's  eulogy,  "To 
Berkeley  every  virtue  under  heaven." 

The  New  Buildings,  built  in  the  modern  Venetian 
Gothic  style,  300  feet  in  length,  and  containing  fifty  luxu 
rious  sets  of  rooms,  next  attract  our  attention;  after  which 
we  visit  the  shaded  walks  in  the  meadows  between  Christ 
Church  and  the  Isis,  than  which  it  is  hard  to  conceive 
of  a  more  beautiful  scholarly  retreat.  These  consist  of 
"  The  New  Meadow  Walk,"  six  hundred  yards  long,  ex 
tending  from  the  New  Buildings  to  the  river;  and  "  Broad 
Walk,"  a  splendid  avenue  of  a  quarter  of  a  mile  in  length 


A   DAY   AT   OXFORD.  315 

and  fifty  feet  in  width,  lined  on  each  side  with  lofty  elms, 
whose  meeting  tops  form  in  a  hot  day  a  most  delicious 
shade.  The  eminent  men  of  whom  Christ  Church  boasts 
as  its  scholars  form  of  themselves  a  dazzling  host.  Among 
them  are  William  Penn,  Locke,  Ben  Jonson,  the  two  Wes- 
leys,  Camden  the  antiquary,  Otway,  Dr.  E.  B.  Pusey,  Sir 
Robert  Peel,  Gladstone,  Sir  G.  C.  Lewis,  Euskin,  Lord 
Derby,  and  scores  of  others  whose  names  have  been 
sounded  hardly  less  loudly  by  the  trump  of  fame. 

Leaving  Christ  Church,  we  visited  college  after  college, 
which  we  found  to  differ  in  detail,  but  all  agreeing  in 
their  general  plan,  and  presenting  something  to  charm 
or  surprise  the  traveller.  Stepping  out  of  the  busy  streets, 
—  for  in  this  respect  the  city  contrasts  with  Cambridge, 
which  has  a  more  quiet,  scholastic  air, — you  go  through 
an  arched  gateway,  and  at  once  find  yourself  enjoying 
the  beautiful  lawns,  the  trees,  ivy,  flowers,  and  fountains 
of  a  quadrangle.  No  person  with  a  spark  of  enthusiasm 
or  love  for  the  picturesque  and  beautiful,  who  has  once 
seen  these  venerable  piles,  can  ever  forget  the  impression 
made  on  him  by  their  cool  cloisters,  whose  pavements 
are  the  tombstones  of  departed  worthies;  their  statues  of 
Kings,  Queens,  and  benefactors;  their  quaint  and  grotesque 
gargoyles;  their  libraries  filled  with  the  rarest  books  and 
manuscripts;  their  chapels  adorned  with  the  monuments 
of  the  mighty  men  who  have  made  England  the  home  of 
freedom,  letters,  and  the  arts;  their  vaulted  roofs;  their 
lofty  columns;  the  splendors  of  their  painted  windows, 
that  blaze  like  sparkling  jewels  in  the  sunlight;  and,  if 
he  has  been  so  fortunate  as  to  enjoy  a  general  view  of 
Oxford's  glories  from  the  roof  of  the  Radcliffe  Library,  or 
the  tower  of  New  College,  he  must  be  made  of  sterner  stuff 


316  A  DAY  AT  OXFORD. 

than  flesh  and  blood  if  he  has  not  cried  out  with  Words 
worth, 

"Ye  spires  of  Oxford!  domes  and  towers! 
Gardens  and  groves!    Your  presence  overpowers 
The  soberness  of  reason." 

Near  by  Christ  Church  is  Pembroke  College,  once  the 
nest  of  those  "  singing  birds,"  Beaumont,  Heywood,  and 
Shenstone,  and  the  Alma  Mater  of  the  eloquent  George 
Whitefield  and  the  sturdy  John  Pym.  Here  that  quaint  old 
fantast,  Sir  Thomas  Browne,  studied;  and  here,  over  the 
gateway,  on  the  second  floor,  roomed  heroic  Samuel  John 
son,  a  commoner,  "poor  as  the  poorest,  proud  as  the 
proudest";  so  poor  that  he  had  but  one  pair  of  shoes,  and 
those  so  old  that  his  feet  peeped  through  them, —  so  proud 
that,  when  a  new  pair  was  placed  by  a  gentleman's  order 
outside  of  his  door,  he  indignantly  flung  them  out  of  the 
window.  Indigence  drove  Johnson  away,  long  before  the 
usual  time,  from  Pembroke ;  but,  though  steeped  in  poverty 
to  the  lips,  he  read,  as  he  said,  "  solidly,"  while  there, 
and  always  regarded  his  Alma  Mater  with  the  profoundest 
veneration  and  love. 

The  oldest  of  the  Oxford  colleges  is  Merton,  on  our 
way  to  which  we  pass  between  two  others,  of  which  we 
must  say  a  word  or  two.  One,  Corpus  Christi,  was  founded 
in  Henry  the  Eighth's  reign,  by  Bishop  Fox,  in  memory 
of  whom  a  tame  fox  was  kept  in  the  college  for  many 
years.  Had  Corpus  nothing  else  to  boast  of  but  those 
two  giants  of  the  English  Church,  Bishop  Jewell  and  the 
judicious  Hooker,  who  were  her  sons,  she  might  well  be 
proud;  but  she  reckons  in  her  roll  many  worthy  suc 
cessors  of  these  giants,  including  that  "  gulf  of  learning," 
John  Rainolds,  Dr.  Buckland,  and  John  Keble,  whose 
"Christian  Year"  had  reached,  seven  years  ago,  its  110th 


A    DAY   AT   OXFORD.  317 

edition  and  265th  thousand.  Directly  opposite  Corpus 
is  Oriel  College,  endowed  by  Edward  II,  in  1326.  Its 
buildings  are  not  remarkable,  but  it  may  challenge  any 
other  college  to  show  a  more  splendid  muster-roll  of  names. 
Here  were  trained  Sir  Walter  Raleigh;  Chief  Justice 
Holt;  Bishop  Butler,  the  author  of  that  impregnable 
bulwark  of  Christianity,  the  "Analogy  of  Natural  and 
Revealed  Religion";  Prynne,  the  stout  Republican,  whose 
ears  were  cut  off  by  Charles  I;  J.  H.  Newman,  the  famous 
"  fugitive  from  the  camp  of  Anglicanism,"  a  man  of  noble 
intellect  and  antique  loftiness  of  soul,  and  one  of  the 
greatest  masters  of  English  of  this  century ;  Dr.  Copleston ; 
Archbishop  Whately,  whose  "  Logic  "  has  crucified  the  wits 
of  so  many  students;  Matthew  Arnold;  "Tom  Brown" 
Hughes;  Bishop  Ken,  the  hymnist;  and  Richard  H.  Froude, 
from  whom  emanated  the  famous  "  Tractarian"  movement; 
and  scores  of  other  men  hardly  less  illustrious.  Merton, 
"  the  primary  model  of  all  the  collegiate  bodies  in  Oxford 
and  Cambridge,"  merits  a  minuter  notice  than  our  space 
permits  us  to  give.  It  has  three  quadrangles,  in  one  of 
the  smallest  of  which  is  the  chapel,  which,  in  grandeur  of 
proportion,  ranks  second  to  none  in  Oxford.  The  side 
windows,  of  which  there  are  fourteen,  illuminated  in 
imitation  of  those  at  Cologne,  are  marvels  of  beauty;  and 
the  great  east  or  Catherine-wheel  window  is  filled  with 
tracery  that  is  rarely  matched  in  delicacy.  In  looking  at 
the  architectural  triumphs  of  this  and  many  other  chapels 
in  Oxford,  where 

"Through  mullioned  windows'  tinted  panes 

The  coloied  radiance  softly  falls, 
And  dyes  with  flickering  roseate  stains 
The  nave  and  aisle,  the  floor  and  walls," 

one  is  tempted  again  and  again  to  ask,  Where  did  these 


318  A   DAY  AT  OXFORD. 

old  masons  of  the  Middle  Ages  learn  the  secrets  of  their 
skill?  They  certainly  seem  to  have  had  more  cunning 
fingers  than  their  modern  successors,  and  to  have  moulded 
their  stone-tracery  as  though  they  were  working  in  some 
plastic  material.  In  the  Middle  Ages,  Merton  College  was 
famous  for  its  professors  in  scholastic  theology.  Brad- 
wardine,  the  great  "  doctor  doctorum " ;  John  Duns  Scotus, 
the  acutest  and  most  subtle-witted  of  the  schoolmen,  whose 
name,  by  a  hard  fate,  has  become  a  synonym  for  stupidity 
(dunce);  Occam,  the  "invincible";  John  Wyckliffe,  Sir 
Richard  Steele,  and  Harvey,  who  discovered  the  circula 
tion  of  the  blood, — all  belonged  to  Merton. 

Next  in  age  to  Merton,  but  some  distance  from  it,  is 
Balliol  College,  founded  in  the  thirteenth  century,  of 
which  Prof.  Jowett,  of  the  famous  "  Essays  and  Reviews M 
memory,  is  Master.  Here  Adam  Smith  the  economist, 
Archbishop  Manning,  and  Bishop  Temple,  Dr.  Arnold's 
successor  at  Rugby,  were  educated.  Among  the  Masters 
of  Balliol  in  the  eighteenth  century  was  a  noted  wit  and 
punster,  Dr.  Theophilus  Leigh.  His  conversation  was  a 
perpetual  stream  of  jests  and  retorts;  but  his  most  suc 
cessful  practical  joke  was  living  to  over  ninety,  when  he 
had  been  elected  Master  on  account  of  his  weak  health 
and  likelihood  to  die  early.  As  a  specimen  of  his  jeux 
cTesprit,  it  is  said  that,  when  some  one  told  him  how,  in 
a  late  dispute  among  the  Privy  Councilors,  the  Lord 
Chancellor  struck  the  table  with  such  violence  that  he 
split  it,  Dr.  Leigh  replied,  "No,  no;  I  can  hardly  per 
suade  myself  that  he  split  the  table,  though  I  believe  he 
divided  the  Board"  Almost  in  death  the  ruling  passion 
triumphed.  Being  told,  in  his  last  sickness,  that  a  friend 
had  been  lately  married,  that  he  had  recovered  from  a 


A    DAY   AT   OXFORD.  319 

long  illness  by  eating  eggs,  and  that  the  wits  said  he  had 
been  egged  on  to  matrimony,  the  Doctor  at  once  trumped 
the  joke  by  adding,  "  Then  may  the  yoke  sit  easy  on  him." 
It  was  to  Dr.  Parsons,  the  forty-fourth  Master  of  this 
College,  afterwards  Vice-Chancellor  of  the'  University,  that 
Theodore  Hook  made  his  reply  when  he  matriculated,  at 
Oxford.  Being  asked  if  he  was  "prepared  to  subscribe 
to  the  Thirty-nine  Articles,"  Theodore  replied,  "Oh, 
certainly,  sir;  forty,  if  you  please!" 

Leaving  Balliol,  we  stroll  down  Broad  street,  and, 
attracted  by  the  sound  of  music,  enter  the  gardens  of 
New  College,  which,  like  New  York,  belies  its  name, 
having  been  founded  in  1379  by  William  of  Wykeham. 
The  gardens  are  charmingly  retired,  and  among  the  most 
beautiful  of  the  many  delicious  retreats  which  Oxford 
offers  to  the  weary  or  meditative  scholar.  We  wonder 
not  that  our  countryman,  the  shy,  contemplative  Haw 
thorne,  was  ravished  by  this  "  sweet,  quiet,  stately,  sacred 
seclusion," — these  lawns  of  the  richest  green  and  softest 
velvet  grass,  shadowed  over  by  ancient  trees,  and  sheltered 
from  the  rude  winds;  for  we  can  conceive  of  nothing 
more  delightful  than  to  spend  an  hour's  leisure,  earned 
by  a  half-dozen  hours  of  hard  study,  in  lounging  about 
or  lying  down  in  these  lovely  grounds,  building  air- 
castles,  planning  new  intellectual  conquests,  or  musing 
over  the  days  of  "  lang  syne."  The  charm  of  the  gar 
dens  is  enhanced  by  the  picturesque  views  one  gets  here 
of  the  college-buildings;  and  one  hears  with  interest  that 
the  boundary  on  one  side  is  the  ancient  city-wall  which 
Cromwell's  artillery  battered  at  the  siege  of  the  town. 
The  music  that  drew  us  here  comes  from  a  fine  band 
attached  to  a  military  company  of  the  students,  which 


320  A   DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

plays  two  or  three  afternoons  in  the  week  for  the  delight 
of  the  scholars  and  their  outside  friends.  The  concert 
ended,  we  attend  the  evening  service  in  the  chapel,  and 
listen  to  some  of  the  most  exquisite  choral  harmonies  that 
have  ever 

"  from  eating  cares 
Lapped  us  in  soft  Lydian  airs." 

The  choir  of  singers  is  the  best-trained,  and  the  chapel 
by  general  consent  the  noblest,  in  Oxford.  The  choir  is 
one  hundred  feet  long;  the  nave,  or  ante-chapel,  eighty 
feet;  it  is  sixty-five  feet  high,  and  thirty-five  broad.  The 
style  of  architecture  is  the  early  perpendicular,  retaining 
much  of  the  simplicity  of  the  decorated,  but  displaying 
the  decided  peculiarities  of  the  later  style.  The  organ, 
whose  capabilities  are  gloriously  revealed  in  the  choral 
service,  is  one  of  the  finest  in  England.  But  the  grand 
attraction  to  most  visitors  is  the  illuminated  windows 
designed  by  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds,  Peckett  of  York,  and 
the  pupils  of  Rubens,  which,  if  beauty,  not  the  admission 
of  light,  be  the  object  of  windows,  must  be  deemed  worthy 
of  high  admiration.  The  original  sketches  for  the  great 
west  window,  by  Reynolds,  were  sold  at  auction,  it  is  said, 
in  1821,  for  £7,229  5s.  In  this  chapel  is  preserved  the 
silver-gilt  pastoral  staff  of  the  founder,  seven  feet  long, 
—  an  exquisite  relic  of  the  finished  style  of  the  jewelers' 
work,  with  enamels,  of  the  period,  and  of  the  most 
elaborate  workmanship.  Lack  of  space  prevents  more 
than  an  allusion  to  the  massive  tower  of  this  college, 
with  its  fine  peal  of  bells,  upon  which  is  inscribed  Wyke- 
ham's  motto,  "Manners  makyth  man";  and  to  the  clois 
ters,  with  their  remarkable  echo,  repeating  sounds  seven 
or  eight  times.  New  College  boasts  many  famous  sons. 
It  was  these  cloisters  that  echoed  Sydney  Smith's  jokes 


A   DAY   AT   OXFORD.  321 

and  laughter;  and  it  was  within  these  walls  that  William 
Pitt  (Lord  Chatham)  learned  to  plume  his  wings  for  his 
grand  oratorical  flights. 

Beautiful  as  is  New  College,  with  its  grand  old  tur- 
reted  tower,  its  splendid  chapel,  and  its  shaded  grounds, 
it  must  yield  the  palm  to  Magdalen,  the  magnificent, 
(for  that  is  the  meaning  of  its  Syriac  name,)  which  we 
are  inclined  to  look  upon  as  the  gem  of  the  Oxford 
colleges.  Magdalen  is,  truly,  a  glorious  establishment, 
and  we  do  not  wonder  that  the  old  University  laureate, 
Antony  a'  Wood,  in  singing  its  praises,  bursts  into  a 
rapturous  strain,  quite  above  his  usual  prosaic  style. 
Grand  old  buildings  this  college  has,  that  gladden  the 
eye  and  captivate  the  imagination,  from  the 

"  High  embowed  roof 
With  antique  pillars  massy  proof," 

and  the  stately  tower  with  its  "tunable  and  melodious 
ring  of  bells,"  down  to  studious  cloisters;  trim  gardens, 
too,  it  has,  full  of  rare  plants  and  flowers;  smooth-shaven 
lawns,  and  arched  walks  of  twilight  groves;  water-walks 
"  as  delectable  as  the  banks  of  Eurotas,  where  Apollo  him 
self  was  wont  to  walk  and  sing  his  lays  " ;  and  rivers  which 
so  pleasantly,  and  with  a  murmuring  noise,  wind  and  turn, 
that  we  are  almost  ready  to  agree  with  honest  Wood, 
that  one  may,  in  a  manner,  say  of  them  that  which  the 
people  of  Angouleme,  in  France,  were  wont  to  say  of  their 
River  Touvre,  that  it  is  "  covered  over  and  checkered  with 
swans,  paved  and  floored  with  trouts,  and  hemmed  and 
bordered  with  crevices."  The  buildings  of  this  college 
which  are  comprised  within  three  quadrangles,  cover  an 
area  of  three  acres.  The  grounds  comprise  more  than 
one  hundred  acres.  Entering  the  college  by  the  beauti- 


322  A   DAY  AT  OXFORD. 

ful  new  gateway,  with  its  canopied  statues  of  Mary  Mag 
dalen,  St.  John  the  Baptist,  and  the  founder  (William 
Waynflete,  Lord  Chancellor  of  England  in  the  reign  of 
Henry  VI),  we  are  greeted  with  one  of  the  most  strik 
ing  displays  of  architectural  beauty  in  Oxford.  Directly 
fronting  us  is  the  west  end  of  the  chapel,  with  a  gor 
geous  window,  and  beneath  it  an  elaborately-ornamented 
doorway,  with  a  shallow  porch  richly  sculptured,  and  sur 
mounted  by  five  statues  in  canopied  niches, —  which,  with 
the  lofty  tower,  one  hundred  and  fifty  feet  high,  with  its 
diadem  of  pinnacles  and  fretted  battlements,  forms  one 
of  the  most  imposing  spectacles  we  have  yet  witnessed. 
The  chapel,  which,  about  forty  years  ago  was  thoroughly 
restored,  at  an  expense  of  £28,000,  is  an  architectural 
gem.  The  altar-screen,  the  oak  seats  and  stalls,  the  or 
gan-screen  of  stone, —  all  the  carvings,  whether  of  stone 
or  wood, —  are  executed  with  the  rarest  felicity.  Mag 
nificent  candelabra,  exquisite  paintings,  and  superb  painted 
windows,  are  among  the  other  beauties  of  this  unique 
place  of  worship;  and  when  we  add  the  powerful  organ, 
which  Cromwell  carried  off  to  Hampton  Court,  but  which 
Charles  II  restored,  it  must  be  admitted  that  this  chapel 
has  few  peers  even  in  this  land  of  chapels.  We  regret 
that  it  was  not  our  good  fortune  to  attend  a  choral  ser 
vice  in  it,  and  hear 

"The  pealing  organ  blow 
To  the  full-voiced  choir  below"; 

for  it  is  said  to   be  solemn  and   impressive  in  a  degree 
rarely  equaled. 

Visiting  the  library;  the  cloisters,  with  their  grotesque 
figures,  which  have  so  puzzled  the  antiquaries;  and  the 
hall,  hung  around  with  portraits;  we  next  pass  by  a  nar- 


A    DAY   AT   OXFORD.  323 

row  passage  into  the  chaplain's  quadrangle,  where  we 
have  another  glorious  view  of  the  tower,  from  its  base 
to  the  top.  Its  simplicity  of  structure  and  its  graceful 
proportions, —  its  union  of  real  solidity  with  extreme 
lightness  of  appearance, —  make  it  one  of  the  finest 
structures  of  its  class  in  England.  Tradition  says  that 
upon  the  top  formerly,  on  every  May  morning  at  four 
o'clock,  a  requiem  was  sung  for  the  soul  of  Henry  VII; 
and  the  custom  of  chanting  a  hymn  there,  beginning 

"  Te  Deum  Patrem  colimus, 
Te  laudibus  prosequimur," 

on  the  same  morning  each  year,  is  still  preserved. 

How  shall  we  do  justice  to  the  charming  grounds  of 
Magdalen, —  the  meadows  with  their  winding,  tree-em 
bowered  walks  along  the  banks  of  the  Cherwell,  theh 
rustic  bridges,  and  the  peep  at  the  antique-looking  water- 
mill?  Can  any  trees  be  grander,  any  lawns  more  soft 
and  pleasant,  any  scholastic  retreats  more  cool  and  shady, 
any  views  more  picturesque  than  these?  And  then  that 
dainty  relic  of  monastic  days,  the  little  Deer-Park;  how 
Old- World-like  it  seems,  as  another  has  said,  to  step  out 
of  the  High-street  of  a  great  city  upon  a  quiet,  secluded 
nook,  where  deer  are  quite  unconcernedly  browsing  among 
huge  old  elms!  It  was  in  these  learned  groves  that  Ad- 
dison  loved  to  linger;  here  Gibbon  studied;  here  the  mel 
ancholy  Collins  wooed  the  genius  of  poetry;  here  glorious 
"Kit  North"  drank  his  earliest  draughts  of  hippocrene; 
and  here,  in  ages  to  come,  will  many  other  Englishmen, 
of  equal  genius,  echo  the  words  of  Antony  a'  Wood: 

"  Thou  dear  old  college,  by  whatever  name 
Natives  or  strangers  call  our  Oxford  "  Queen," 
To  me,  from  days  long  past,  thou  art  the  same, 
Maudlin  — or  Magdalen  — or  Magdalene." 


324  A   DAY  AT  OXFORD. 

Leaving  Magdalen,  we  next  proceed  to  the  Bodleian 
library,  founded  in  1409,  and  refounded  by  "  that  full 
solempne  man,"  Sir  Thomas  Bodley,  in  1602.  This  vast 
collection  comprises  about  four  hundred  thousand  vol 
umes, —  a  wilderness  of  books, —  and  is  remarkable  not 
only  for  its  size,  but  for  the  peculiar  character  of  its 
"  volumed  wonders."  It  is  said  that  no  other  library  of 
similar  extent  in  Europe, —  none  in  Paris,  Brussels,  Frank 
fort,  Munich,  Valladolid,  or  Madrid, —  has  so  conventual  a 
character.  Associated  with  all  the  great  traditions  of 
England,  from  the  age  of  Duke  Humphrey,  its  original 
founder,  down  to  the  present  century, —  from  the  days 
when  Queen  Elizabeth,  in  ruff  and  farthingale,  with 
Burghley  and  Walsingham  at  her  side,  harangued  the 
doctors  and  Heads  of  Houses  in  Latin,  to  the  time  when 
the  Allied  Sovereigns  celebrated  the  downfall  of  Napo 
leon  within  its  walls, —  it  is  no  wonder  that  its  treasures 
of  books,  manuscripts,  and  rarities  have  a  kind  of  unique 
ness  and  quaint  antiquity  about  them,  not  found  else 
where.  An  adequate  account  of  the  bibliographical  curi 
osities  which  are  accumulated  here  would  fill  a  goodly 
volume.  Truly  may  the  scholar,  as  he  sits  in  the  read 
ing  cells  and  curtained  cages  of  "  old  Bodley,"  murky 
in  its  antiquity,  redolent  of  old  bindings,  fragrant  with 
moth-scented  coverings,  say  with  Southey, 

"  My  days  among  the  dead  are  passed, 

Around  me  I  behold, 
Where'er  these  casual  eyes  are  cast, 
The  mighty  minds  of  old." 

Here  are  a  "  History  of  Troy,"  printed  by  Caxton  at  Bru 
ges  in  1472,  the  first  book  printed  in  the  English  language; 
a  copy  of  Caedmon's  Anglo-Saxon  version  of  Genesis,  made 
about  A.  D.  1000;  a  Bible  collection,  including  almost 


A   DAY   AT   OXFOKD.  325 

every  known  version;  an  Aldine  edition  of  Ovid's  "Meta 
morphoses,"  containing  a  genuine  autograph  of  Shakespeare ; 
a  Latin  Bible  printed  by  Gutenberg  at  Mentz  about  1455, 
the  first  book  printed  from  movable  types;  an  Italian 
sermon,  translated  by  Queen  Elizabeth  into  Latin,  whilst 
Princess,  and  written  in  her  own  handwriting;  and  hun 
dreds  of  other  similar  rarities.  Here  are  the  collections  of 
Dr.  Dee,  the  earliest  of  spirit-rappers,  who  "  did  observe  and 
write  down  what  was  said  by  the  spirits";  here  are  gar 
nered  up  all  the  correspondence  of  Lord  Clarendon,  and 
the  little  notes  that  passed  between  him  and  Charles  I,  in 
the  lobby  of  the  House  of  Commons,  during  the  debates 
that  cost  the  King  his  crown ;  and  here,  too,  are  the  corre 
spondence  of  the  Parliamentary  generals,  and  the  papers  of 
the  famous  non-jurors.  Passing  to  the  upper  story  of  the 
library  building,  we  enter  the  Picture  Gallery,  which 
comprises  three  sides  of  the  quadrangle.  The  pictures 
are  chiefly  portraits  of  benefactors  of  the  University  and 
of  eminent  literary  men,  by  Vandyke,  Lily,  Kneller,  Jan- 
sen,  Reynolds,  and  others.  Along  the  centre  of  the  rooms 
are  models  of  the  ancient  temples  of  Greece  and  Italy;  a 
very  curious  one  of  a  subterranean  palace  in  Guzerat;  an 
elaborate  model  of  the  Cathedral  of  Calcutta;  and  one  of 
the  Maison  Carree  of  Nismes  in  France.  Among  the 
rarities  in  the  room  are  a  chair  made  out  of  "  The 
Golden  Hind,"  the  ship  in  which  Drake  circumnavigated 
the  globe,  and  the  veritable  lantern  of  Guy  Fawkes. 

Our  sketch  is  long,  and  yet  we  have  said  nothing  of  the 
Arundel  marbles;  nothing  of  the  RatclifFe  library,  with  its 
antique  statues,  busts,  Italian  marbles,  and  especially,  its 
lofty  dome,  from  the  balustrade  surrounding  whose  exterior 
you  may  have  a  fine  panoramic  view  of  the  "  city  of  spires 


326  A    DAY   AT   OXFORD. 

and  pinnacles " ;  nothing  of  the  magnificent  Taylor  Insti 
tute,  with  its  art-treasures,  including  paintings,  statues, 
original  drawings  by  Raphael  and  Angelo,  purchased  at  a 
cost  of  £7,000,  and  which  are  marked  with  all  the  beauty 
and  grandeur  that  distinguished  their  public  works ;  nothing 
of  the  Ashmolean  Museum,  or  the  New  Museum  (346  feet 
by  145),  packed  full  with  collections  and  specimens  in  every 
department  of  science;  nothing  of  the  exquisitely-beautiful 
Martyrs'  Memorial,  73  feet  high,  with  richly- canopied 
statues,  erected  near  the  spot  where  the  three  Bishops, — 
Cranmer,  Ridley,  and  Latimer, —  in  blinding  smoke  and 
tormenting  flames,  yielded  up  their  lives  at  the  stake;  and 
we  have  barely  alluded  to  St.  Mary's  Church,  whose  "  sym 
metric  pride  "  so  dazzles  the  beholder  when  the  pale  moon 
light  falls  on  spire,  buttresses,  statues,  and  pinnacles. 
As  we  look  back  in  imagination  upon  these  sights  and 
scenes,  to  which  we  bade  adieu  but  a  few  years  ago,  they 
flit  before  us,  though  fixed  forever  in  the  mind,  like  the 
pleasant  memories  of  a  dream.  Even  after  a  hurried  peep 
at  the  glories  of  this  vast  establishment,  we  cease  to  wonder 
that  Lipsius,  on  first  beholding  them,  declared  with  fervor 
that  one  college  of  this  university  was  greater  in  its  power 
and  splendor,  that  it  glorified  and  illustrated  the  honors  of 
literature  more  conspicuously  by  the  pomps  with  which  it 
invested  the  ministers  and  machinery  of  education,  than 
any  entire  university  of  the  Continent.  Go,  reader,  and 
see  for  yourself  this  home  of  letters,  and  you  will  confess 
that  we  hare  not  told  you  half  the  truth  of  this  wondrous 
town,  which  you  will  evermore  think  of  as 

"A  rich  gem,  in  circling  gold  enshrined, 
Where  Isis'  waters  wind 

Along  the  sweetest  shore 
That  ever  felt  fair  Culture's  hands, 

Or  Spring's  embroidered  mantle  wore." 


AN   HOUR  AT   CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL. 


AMONG  the  strange  and  unique  sights  which  attract 
if*-  the  eye  of  the  stranger  in  London,  one  of  the 
oddest  is  the  apparition,  in  the  neighborhood  of  Newgate 
street,  of  a  boy  dressed  in  a  monastic  garb  of  the  sixteenth 
century.  It  is  raining,  yet  he  is  bareheaded,  and  he  wears 
a  long,  flowing,  dark-blue  coat,  like  a  monk's  tunic,  confined 
at  the  waist  by  a  leather  belt,  which,  with  yellow  breeches, 
shoes,  and  yellow  stockings,  complete  his  quaint  costume. 
Who  is  he?  Is  he  the  ghost  of  some  boy  of  the  sixteenth 
century,  or  is  he  a  living,  flesh-and-blood  urchin  of  the 
nineteenth  century,  arrayed  in  the  garb  of  a  bygone  time? 
We  need  not  be  ashamed  to  confess  our  inability  to  solve 
this  problem,  for  it  is  one  which  puzzled  even  so  acute  and 
ingenious  a  thinker  as  Sydney  Smith.  The  witty  Canon  of 
St.  Paul's  brooded  long  over  the  origin  of  the  Bluecoat 
Boy, — for  it  is  by  this  name  he  is  ycleped, —  and  finally  haz 
arded  the  theory  that  he  was  a  Quaker  in  the  chrysalis  state. 
"Look  at  the  circumstances,"  he  urged,  in  a  discussion 
with  the  Countess  of  Morley;  "  at  a  very  early  age,  young 
Quakers  disappear, —  at  a  very  early  age  the  Coat  Boys 
are  seen;  at  the  age  of  seventeen  or  eighteen  young 
Quakers  are  again  seen, —  at  the  same  age,  the  Coat  Boys 
disappear;  who  has  ever  heard  of  a  Coat  Man?  The 
thing  is  utterly  unknown  in  natural  history.  That  such 
a  fact  should  have  escaped  our  naturalists  is  truly  aston 
ishing.  .  .  .  Dissection  would  throw  great  light  on  the 


328  AN  HOUR  AT  CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL. 

question;  and,  if  our  friend  would  receive  two  boys 

into  his  house  about  the  time  of  their  changing  their 
coats,  great  service  would  be  rendered  to  the  cause.  I 
I  have  ascertained  that  the  Bluecoat  infants  are  fed  with 
drab-colored  pap,  which  looks  very  suspicious."  To  these 
daring  speculations  Lady  Morley  replied  with  reasonings 
equally  shrewd  and  hard  to  answer.  The  possible  cor 
rectness  of  Sydney's  theory  she  admitted;  but  there  was 
a  grave  difficulty:  "The  Bluecoat  is  an  indigenous  animal, 
— not  so  the  Quaker.  ...  I  have  seen  and  talked  much 
with  Sir  R.  Ker  Porter  on  this  interesting  subject.  He 
has  traveled  over  the  whole  habitable  globe,  and  has 
penetrated  with  a  scientific  and  scrutinizing  eye  into 
regions  unexplored  by  civilized  man,  and  yet  he  has 
never  seen  a  Quaker  baby.  He  has  lived  for  years  in 
Philadelphia  (the  national  nest  of  Quakers) ;  he  has  roamed 
up  and  down  Broadways,  and  lengthways  in  every  nook 
and  corner  of  Pennsylvania,  and  yet  he  never  saw  a 
Quaker  baby;  and  what  is  new  and  most  striking,  never 
did  he  see  a  Quaker  lady  in  a  situation  which  gave  hope 
that  a  Quaker  baby  might  be  seen  hereafter.  This  is  a 
stunning  fact,  and  involves  the  question  in  such  impene 
trable  mystery  as  will,  I  fear,  defy  even  your  sagacity, 
acuteness,  and  industry  to  elucidate." 

How  the  question  was  settled, —  whether  Sydney  con 
tinued  to  maintain  that  there  never  was  such  a  thing  as 
a  Quaker  baby,  that  "  they  are  always  born  broad-brim 
med  and  in  full  quake," — we  know  not;  and  therefore, 
in  lieu  of  other  authority,  we  will  accept  the  traditionary 
history  of  the  Bluecoats.  According  to  this,  Christ's  Hos 
pital,  or  the  Bluecoat  School,  was  founded  in  1553  by 
Edward  VI,  in  his  sixteenth  year,  just  before  his  death. 


AN   HOUR   AT   CHRIST'S   HOSPITAL.  329 

The  buildings  were  erected  on  the  site  of  the  monastery  of 
the  Gray  Friars,  of  which  a  few  arches,  a  part  of  a  cloister, 
are  all  that  remains;  and  the  queer  costume  of  the  boys, 
which  they  intensely  dislike,  was  adopted  at  the  time.  The 
flat  caps  supplied  to  them  are  so  small  that  the  boys  rarely 
wear  them,  and  go  bareheaded.  In  1672,  Charles  II  founded 
the  Mathematical  School  for  forty  boys,  called  "  King's 
Boys,"  to  which  twelve  more  have  been  added;  and  they 
are  distinguished  by  a  badge  on  the  shoulder.  The  school 
now  has  an  income  of  £40,000  a  year,  and  it  feeds,  clothes, 
and  educates  twelve  hundred  children,  of  whom  five  hun 
dred,  including  the  younger  children  and  girls,  are  kept 
in  a  branch  school  at  Hertford,  for  the  sake  of  pure  air. 
It  was  through  the  kindness  of  Messrs.  Triibner  &  Co., 
the  celebrated  publishers  and  booksellers,  whose  shop  on 
Ludgate  Hill,  London,  is  within  a  stone's  throw  of 
Christ's  Hospital,  that  we  found  an  "  Open  Sesame "  to 
the  famous  school.  While  indulging  our  bibliomaniac 
propensities  there  one  day,  we  were  so  lucky  as  to  be 
introduced  to  Dr.  Brette;  Professor  of  Modern  Languages 
in  the  school,  who  kindly  invited  us  to  visit  it  the  next 
day.  Christ's  Hospital!  Where  is  the  scholar  or  literary 
man  whose  pulse  does  not  quicken  at  the  mention  of 
these  words?  What  a  crowd  of  pleasant  memories  they 
conjure  up!  Who,  that  has  skimmed  but  the  surface  of 
modern  English  literature,  has  not  read  Charles  Lamb's 
charming  "Recollections"  of  that  school?  Christ's  Hospi 
tal!  where  not  only  the  loving  Carlagnulus,  as  he  was 
afterwards  called,  but  Coleridge,  "  the  inspired  charity- 
boy,"  and  Camden,  and  Leigh  Hunt,  and  scores  of  other 
worthies,  began  their  education, —  how  did  our  hearts 
leap  up  at  the  prospect  of  seeing  the  very  benches 


330  AH  HOUE  AT   CHRIST^  HOSPITAL. 

which  they  hacked,  the  very  spots  where  they  quailed 
under  the  eagle  glance  and  thunder  tones  of  Boyer! 
Accepting  Dr.  B.'s  invitation,  we  next  day  proceeded  to 
Newgate  street,  and,  passing  the  gloomy  prison,  turned 
into  a  cross-street,  where,  aoout  noon,  we  entered  the 
boy-King's  school.  Entering  a  corridor,  we  notice  on  the 
wall  numerous  tablets  placed  there  in  honor  of  the  grad 
uates  of  the  school  who  have  become  its  benefactors. 
Not  a  few  of  England's  "solid  men"  of  business,  who 
were  educated  here,  have  left  handsome  legacies  to  the 
institution.  The  buildings  consist  of  several  large  struct 
ures  of  brick,  fronting  paved  courts,  which  serve  as  play 
grounds  for  the  boys  in  sunny  weather,  while  the  corri 
dors  shield  them  from  the  rain  in  wet  weather.  Following 
the  lead  of  Dr.  Brette,  we  visit  a  school-room,  where  the 
hard  seats  and  benches,  with  deep  gashes  testifying  to  the 
excellence  of  English  cutlery,  remind  us  of  the  pine 
planks  upon  which  we  tried  our  Rogers  in  the  old  red 
school-house  of  our  boyhood.  Was  there  ever  a  school 
boy  who  did  not  make  his  mark  with  his  jack-knife, 
whatever  his  failures  in  recitation? 

The  eulogists  of  "modern  improvements"  will  find 
but  little  to  admire  in  these  venerable  piles,  except  the 
swimming-room, —  the  water  of  which  is  tempered  at 
pleasure, —  the  admirable  bathing-rooms,  of  which  the 
boys  are  required  to  make  use  at  prescribed  times, —  and 
the  clean  and  airy  hospital,  where  boys  who  are  unwell, 
or  who  have  met  with  an  injury  in  their  sports,  are  cared 
for  by  skillful  surgeons  and  tender  nurses.  Visiting  these 
apartments,  we  next  glance  at  the  dormitories,  with  their 
multitude  of  iron  bedsteads  and  the  monitor's  room  in 
the  corner;  and  then  return  to  the  playground,  where 


AN  HOUR  AT  CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL.  331 

memory  is  busy  calling  up  the  history  of  the  Bluecoats 
whose  names  have  been  blazoned  high  on  the  scroll  of 
fame.  Can  it  be,  we  musingly  ask  ourselves,  that  the 
spider-legged,  spectral-looking  "  Elia "  once  trod  these 
courts,  and  trembled  in  yon  rooms  under  the  master's 
frown?  Did  Home  Tooke  here  begin  the  "Diversions  of 
Purley,"  and  Wesley  shout  in  his  boyish  games  as  he 
never  did  afterwards  in  the  Methodist  class-room?  Did 
the  thoughtful  Addison  and  the  careless,  impulsive  Dicky 
Steele  here  kick  the  football,  and  little  Barrow  begin  the 
pugilistic  feats  which  he  afterwards  repeated  with  such 
effect  in  his  struggle  with  an  Algerine  corsair?  Was  it 
here  that  the  youthful  Blackstone  tested  in  boyish  games 
the  strength  of  the  British  Constitution;  and  was  it  from 
this  school  that  Mitchell,  the  translator  of  "Aristophanes," 
was  translated  to  Cambridge?  All  these  names  are  on  the 
muster-rolls  of  the  Bluecoat  School,  and  many  others 
hardly  less  brilliant. 

We  think  of  these,  and  of  the  Bedlam  cells  to  which 
naughty  boys  in  Elia's  time  were  consigned;  little  fellows 
of  seven  years  shut  up  aL  night  in  these  dungeons,  where 
they  could  just  lie  at  length  upon  straw  and  a  blanket; 
with  only  a  peep  of  light  by  day,  let  in  from  a  prison- 
orifice  at  the  top ;  and  permitted  to  come  forth  only  twice 
a  week  and  then  to  be  flogged  by  the  beadle.  We  think 
of  the  fierce  master,  Boyer,  and  his  two  wigs, —  the  one 
serene,  smiling,  fresh -powdered,  and  betokening  a  mild 
day, —  the  other,  an  old,  discolored,  unkempt,  angry  caxon, 
denoting  frequent  and  bloody  execution.  We  see  him  shak 
ing  his  knotty  fist  at  a  poor,  trembling  child,  and  crying, 
"Sirrah,  do  you  presume  to  set  your  wits  at  me?" — then 
flinging  back  into  his  lair,  and  after  a  few  moments 


332  AN  Hotm  AT  CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL. 

bounding  forth  again,  and  singling  out  a  lad  with  the 
exclamation,  "  Od's  my  life,  sirrah,  I  have  a  great  mind 
to  whip  you,"  which  imperfect  sense  he  speedily  "  pieces 
out,"  as  if  it  had  been  some  devil's  litany,  with  the  ex- 
pletory  yell,  "  and  /  WILL,  too."  We  see  the  "  gentle 
Elia"  in  another  room,  where  the  thunders  rolled  innoc 
uous,  listening  to  the  Ululantes,  and  catching  glimpses  of 
Tartarus;  we  hear  Coleridge,  hardly  yet  in  his  teens, 
unfolding  the  mysteries  of  Plotinus,  or  reciting  Homer 
or  Pindar  in  his  Greek,  to  the  wonderment  of  the  visit 
ors.  We  think,  too,  of  Coleridge's  pious  ejaculation 
when  told  that  his  old  master  was  on  his  death-bed: 
"  Poor  J.  B. !  may  all  his  faults  be  forgotten,  and  may  he 
be  wafted  to  bliss  by  little  cherub  boys  all  head  and  wings, 
with  no  bottoms  to  reproach  his  sublunary  infirmities!" 

We  think  of  the  poor  scholar  who  conveyed  to  his 
room  his  fragments  of  coarse  meat,  which  he  was  sup 
posed  to  sell  to  beggars,  for  which  he  was  excommunicated 
by  the  other  boys  as  a  gag-eater,  until  the  kind  steward 
found  that  he  carried  home  the  scraps,  which  he  denied 
himself,  to  his  starving  parents.  We  think  of  the  silver 
medal  which  the  noble  lad  received  for  this  from  the 
Governor  of  the  school;  and  then,  perhaps,  our  thoughts 
revert  to  another  boy,  the  petty  Nero,  afterwards  seen  a 
culprit  in  the  hulks,  who  actually  branded  a  boy  who  had 
offended  him,  with  a  red-hot  iron, — and  who  nearly  starved 
forty  younger  lads,  by  exacting  from  them  daily  one-half 
of  their  bread  to  pamper  a  young  ass,  which  he  had  con 
trived  to  smuggle  in,  and  keep  upon  the  leads  of  the 
ward,  as  the  dormitories  were  called,  till  the  foolish 
beast,  waxing  fat,  and  kicking  in  the  fulness  of  bread, 
betrayed  him  by  braying.  All  these,  and  many  other 


AN  HOUR  AT  CHRIST'S  HOSPITAL.  333 

recollections,  comic  or  touching,  are  related  by  Lamb  and 
Coleridge  in  their  own  inimitable  style,  but  hardly  seemed 
to  us,  when  we  were  4,000  miles  away,  as  they  do  now, 
realities.  It  was  here,  too,  that  the  following  ludicrous 
scene  occurred,  narrated  by  some  graduate,  to  omit  which, 
in  an  account  of  this  famous  school,  would  be  like  blot 
ting  Moses1  experience  from  the  Vicar  of  Wakefield: 

Among  the  scholars,  when  Lamb  and  Coleridge  attended, 
was  a  poor  clergyman's  son,  by  the  name  of  Simon  Jennings. 
On  account  of  his  dismal  and  gloomy  nature,  his  playmates 
had  nicknamed  him  Pontius  Pilate.  One  morning  he  went 
up  to  the  master,  Dr.  Boyer,  and  said,  in  his  usual  whim 
pering  manner,  "  Please,  Dr.  Boyer,  the  boys  all  call  me 
Pontius  Pilate.1'  If  there  was  one  thing  which  old  Boyer 
hated  more  than  a  false  quantity  in  Greek  and  Latin,  it 
was  the  practice  of  nicknaming.  Hushing  down  among 
the  scholars  from  his  pedestal  of  state,  with  cane  in  hand, 
he  cried,  with  his  usual  voice  of  thunder:  "Listen,  boys; 
the  next  time  I  hear  any  of  you  say  *  Pontius  Pilate,'  I'll 
cane  you  as  long  as  this  cane  will  last.  You  are  to  say 
'  Simon  Jennings,'  not  '  Pontius  Pilate.'  Remember  that, 
if  you  value  your  hides."  Having  said  this,  Jupiter 
Tonans  remounted  Olympus,  the  clouds  still  hanging  on 
his  brow. 

The  next  day,  when  the  same  class  were  reciting  the 
Catechism,  a  boy  of  remarkably  dull  and  literal  turn  of 
mind  had  to  repeat  the  creed.  He  had  got  as  far  as 
"  suffered  under,1'  and  was  about  popping  out  the  next 
word,  when  Boyer's  prohibition  unluckily  flashed  upon  his 
obtuse  mind.  After  a  moment's  hesitation  he  blurted  out, 
"suffered  under  Simon  Jennings,  was  cruci — ."  The  rest 
of  the  word  was  never  uttered,  for  Boyer  had  already 


334  AN   HOUR   AT   CHRIST'S   HOSPITAL. 

sprung  like  a  tiger  upon  him,  and  the  cane  was  descending 
upon  his  unfortunate  shoulders  like  a  Norwegian  hail-storm 
or  an  Alpine  avalanche.  When  the  irate  Doctor  had  dis 
charged  his  cane-storm  upon  him,  he  cried:  "  What  do  you 
mean,  you  booby,  by  such  blasphemy?"  " I  only  did  as  you 
told  me,"  replied  the  simple-minded  Christ-Churchian. 
"Did.  as  I  told  you?"  roared  old  Boyer,  now  wound  up 
to  something  above  the  boiling  point.  "  What  do  you 
mean?"  As  he  said  this,  he  again  instinctively  grasped 
his  cane  more  furiously.  "  Yes,  Doctor,  you  said  we  were 
always  to  call  '  Pontius  Pilate '  '  Simon  Jennings.1  Didn't 
he,  Sam?"  appealed  the  unfortunate  culprit  to  Coleridge, 
who  was  next  to  him.  Sam  said  nought;  but  old  Boyer, 
who  saw  what  a  dunce  he  had  to  deal  with,  cried,  "  Boy, 
you  are  a  fool.  Where  are  your  brains?"  Poor  Dr. 
Boyer  for  a  second  time  was  floored,  for  the  scholar  said, 
with  an  earnestness  which  proved  its  truth,  but  to  the 
intense  horror  of  the  learned  potentate,  "  In  my  stomach, 
sir."  The  Doctor  ever  afterwards  respected  that  boy's 
stupidity,  as  though  half  afraid  that  a  stray  blow  might 
be  unpleasant.  ,  ^ 

But,  whoop!  our  musings  are  interrupted  by  shouts, 
and  away  bounds  a  football,  followed  by  an  avalanche 
of  boys,  screaming,  pushing,  kicking,  jostling,  and  tum 
bling  headlong,  very  much  like  boys  in  America,  and 
showing,  by  their  earnestness,  impetuosity,  and  energy, 
that  they  belong  to  the  nineteenth  century,  and  not  to 
the  sixteenth.  But  what  a  plague  their  long  coats  are, 
and  how  strange  that  the  Governors  do  not  see  the  gro- 
tesqueness  and  inconvenience  of  these  old  monkish  cos 
tumes!  To  play  their  games  the  boys  tuck  up  their 
coat-tails,  and  so,  we  suppose,  will  have  to  do  for  years 


AN    HOUE   AT   CHRIST'S   HOSPITAL.  335 

to  come,  till  John  Bull  can  see  that  modern  garments 
may  be  substituted  without  impairing  the  stability  of  the 
British  Constitution. 

But,  hark!  a  burst  of  martial  music  is  heard;  the 
boys  have  dropped  the  footballs,  and,  under  the  directions 
of  a  drill-master,  are  marshaled  in  platoons,  each  display 
ing  its  number  on  a  flag.  After  a  series  of  evolutions, 
they  march,  seven  hundred  strong,  with  a  boy-band  of 
thirty  performers  at  their  head,  up  the  grand  staircase 
to  the  Gothic  hall,  to  dinner.  This  magnificent  hall, 
which  was  completed  in  1829,  is  187  feet  long,  is  lighted 
by  large  stained-glass  windows,  has  an  organ  gallery  at 
one  end,  and  the  walls  are  hung  with  portraits  of  the 
founder  and  benefactors  of  the  institution.  We  take  seats 
on  a  platform  on  the  west  side  of  the  hall;  a  bell  is 
touched,  and  a  boy  at  the  organ  plays  an  anthem,  while 
seven  hundred  children's  voices  mingle  in  the  chant  of 
thanksgiving.  Another  bell,  and  down  sit  the  boys,  off 
come  the  covers,  and  Bluecoats  wait  on  Bluecoats,  until 
all  have  quieted  their  barking  stomachs  with  a  plentiful 
supply  of  meat,  potatoes,  bread,  and,  above  all,  beer.  The 
boys  themselves  clear  the  tables,  and,  after  a  few  minutes' 
chat  with  them,  we  leave  the  hall,  with  many  thanks  to 
Dr.  Brette  for  his  courtesies,  and  a  feeling  that  hence 
forth  the  writings  of  "Elia"  and  the  "  Highgate  Sage" 
will  have  for  us  an  added  charm,  if  it  is  possible  for 
Us  to  hang  with  profounder  interest  over  their  bewitch 
ing  pages.  Meanwhile,  if  any  of  our  readers  care  to  see 
the  famous  old  school  as  it  has  been  for  three  centuries, 
they  must  cross  the  ocean  soon,  for  these  venerable  piles  are 
speedily  to  be  swept  away,  to  make  room  for  the  ruthless 
locomotives  of  the  Mid-London  Railway. 


BOOK-BUYING. 


I)  EADER,  were  you  ever  afflicted  with  that  hopelessly - 
-"-**  incurable  disease,  ycleped  bibliomania, —  that  disease 
which  sends  its  victim  daily  to  Appleton's  or  Scribner's 
to  empty  his  pocket-book  freely  in  the  purchase  of  rare 
and  curious  editions,  or,  perhaps,  luxurious  modern  edi 
tions,  of  favorite  old  authors,  flaunting  in  the  bravery  of 
large,  clear  type,  with  snow-white  paper, —  a  rivulet  of 
ink  in  a  meadow  of  margin?  Do  you  know  what  it  is 
to  be  drawn  to  the  book  salesroom  with  an  attraction  like 
that  of  the  steel  to  the  magnet,  and  to  find  the  tap  of 
the  auctioneer's  hammer  as  irresistible  as  is  the  roll  of 
the  roulette-ball  to  the  gambler,  or  the  music  of  cork- 
drawing  to  the  toper?  Did  you  ever  stand  for  hours 
wistfully  turning  over  the  pages  of  some  coveted  volume, 
vainly  racking  your  brains  for  some  art  by  which,  with 
your  limited  funds,  to  make  it  your  own?  Did  you  ever 
feel  your  heart  sink  within  you  when,  through  your  hes 
itation,  or,  more  likely,  the  depletion  of  your  purse,  some 
ardently-coveted  volume,  on  which  you  had  fastened  with 
longing  eyes, —  which,  in  imagination,  you  had  already 
seen  snugly  stowed  in  a  corner  of  your  library, —  passed 
by  the  inexorable  law  of  the  hammer  to  some  luckier 
individual?  Have  you  not  deplored  a  thousand,  times  the 
fatality  that  led  you  to  haunt  these  marts  of  literature, 
and  resolved,  and  re-resolved,  and  resolved  again,  never 
more  to  be  seduced  by  the  witchery  of  tree-calf,  fine  tool- 


BOOK  -  BUYING.  337 

ing,  or  luxurious  type  and  paper?  And  yet,  if  the  book- 
buying  disease  had  fairly  seized  on  you,  did  you  ever 
succeed  in  extirpating  it,  stern  as  might  be  the  necessity 
for  economy?  If  you  got  it  under  for  a  week,  or  pos 
sibly  for  a  month,  did  you  not  invariably  find,  in  the  very 
ecstasy  of  your  triumph,  that  it  had  temporarily  abated 
only  to  break  forth  with  tenfold  fury? 

If  you  have  ever  experienced  the  feelings  we  have 
described,  we  can  sympathize  with  you.  We  have  been  a 
life-long  victim  of  the  disease,  which  early  became  chronic 
and  incurable.  Our  ruin  da,ted  from  the  hour  when  we 
bought  our  first  duplicate.  This  downward  step,  as  John 
Hill  Burton  says,  is  fraught  with  fearful  consequences; 
it  is  like  the  first  secret  dram  swallowed  in  the  forenoon, 
or  the  first  pawning  of  the  silver  spoons;  there  is  no  hope 
for  the  patient  after  this:  "It  rends  at  once  the  veil  of 
decorum  spun  out  of  the  flimsy  sophisms  by  which  he  has 
been  deceiving  his  friends,  and  partially  deceiving  him 
self,  into  the  belief  that  his  previous  purchases  were 
necessary,  or,  at  all  events,  serviceable  for  professional 
and  literary  purposes.  He  now  becomes  shameless  and 
hardened;  and  it  is  observable,  in  the  career  of  this  class 
of  unfortunates,  that  the  first  act  of  duplicity  is  immedi 
ately  followed  by  an  access  of  the  disorder,  and  a  reckless 
abandonment  to  its  propensities." 

Shall  we  ever  forget  the  evenings  passed  in  "lang 
syne"  at  Leonard's,  in  the  American  Athens, —  at  Bangs's, 
in  Gotham, —  or  at  Lord's,  in  the  City  of  Brotherly  Love, 
mobs,  and  firemen's  fights,  in  watching  the  sale  of  those 
darlings  in  calf  or  turkey-morocco,  on  which  we  had  set 
our  affections?  How,  like  many  a  lover  by  the  side  of 
flesh-and-blood  mistresses,  did  we  sigh  for  wealth  for  their 
15 


338  BOOK  -  BUYING. 

sake!  The  beauties!  we  would  have  embraced  them  all; 
but,  alas!  a  terrible  presentiment  weighed  upon  our  mind 
touching  the  number  we  should  be  able  to  secure  in  the 
awful  conflict  of  the  evening.  The  Duke  of  York,  nam 
ing  the  select  courtiers  whom  he  wished  to  be  saved  from 
the  wreck  of  the  Gloucester  frigate,  leaving  the  rest  to 
perish,  was  but  a  faint  type  of  our  gloomy  self,  deciding 
among  scores  of  coveted  volumes  upon  the  few  choicest  and 
most  fondly-prized  ones,  which  we  were  most  anxious  to 
carry  to  the  dry  land  of  our  own  snug  bookcase  at  home. 
Then  how  anxiously  we  weighed  the  chances, —  how  pro 
foundly  we  estimated  the  probabilities, —  of  securing,  or 
not  securing,  the  favorites!  Perhaps  our  capital  was 
enough  only  to  warrant  the  hope  of  winning  one  goodly- 
sized  volume, —  a  fine  old  copy  of  Selden,  Fuller,  Burton,  or 
Sir  Thomas  Browne;  should  we  concentrate  all  our  finan 
cial  resources  upon  that,  or  should  we  divide  our  affec 
tions  and  our  cash  among  two  or  three  smaller  volumes? 
Perhaps, —  hateful  thought!  —  the  very  book  or  books  we 
yearned  for  might  be  eyed  and  coveted  by  some  richer 
rival,  who  would  outbid  us.  The  work  came  early  in  the 
catalogue;  there  would  be  few  present;  it  would  go  cheap. 
It  was  in  the  middle  of  the  list, —  the  very  noon  of  the 
sale;  it  would  go  dear.  Oh!  how  we  dreaded  to  see  cer 
tain  well-known  faces  peering  through  the  crowd!  Never 
have  we  had  rivals  whom  we  feared  or  hated  more  than 
rival  book-buyers.  Even  when  we  neither  saw  nor  heard 
any  person  who  had  fixed  his  affections  on  the  book  we 
longed  for,  there-  was  sure  to  be  some  lynx-eyed  Burn- 
ham,  or  other  "Antique-Bokestore "  man,  who  would 
'fight  to  the  last  dollar,  or,  at  least,  make  us  pay  dearly 
for  the  treasure  if  we  won  it.  With  what  perfect  malig- 


BOOK  -  BUYING.  339 

nity  did  we  regard  these  cruel,  remorseless,  but  crafty, 
old  fellows, —  these  tyrants, —  who  bid  off  the  precious 
volumes,  not  from  any  love  of  them,  but  from  the  mean 
and  sordid  motive  of  making  money! 

There  are  some  persons  who  have  no  sympathy  with 
the  inveterate  book-buyer;  who  cannot  appreciate  the 
miser-like  feeling  which  prompts  a  man  to  accumulate 
on  his  shelves  hundreds  of  volumes  which  he  can  never 
read.  There  are  those  to  whom  the  artificial  refinements 
which  have  grown  up  about  the  outside  of  literature 
yield  no  pleasure, —  to  whom  one  of  Pickering's  gorgeous 
editions,  or  even  one  of  Aldus  himself,  has  no  greater 
charms  than  the  same  work  on  flimsy  paper  and  in 
shabby  sheep.  They  read  purely  for  information.  A 
book  to  them  is  a  storehouse  of  ideas  and  facts,  or  a 
mine  to  be  quarried  and  worked,  after  which  they  care 
not  what  happens  to  it.  The  volumes  they  have  read  are 
to  them  shells  without  kernels,  oranges  that  have  been 
squeezed.  They  never  acquire  a  love  for  a  book,  as  a 
true  smoker  does  for  his  pipe,  apart  from  its  uses.  No 
pleasant  associations  or  delicious  memories  cluster  about 
their  volumes,  which  the  bare  sight  of  them,  after  ab 
sence,  conjures  up.  No  pets  or  darlings  of  the  heart 
have  they;  their  souls  never  warm  to  a  book.  They  can 
not  understand  the  feeling  which  prompted  Charles  Lamb 
to  kiss  a  long-coveted  old  folio  which  he  had  found  at  a 
bookstall.  The  best  book  in  the  world,  after  they  have 
sucked  out  all  its  marrow,  is  to  these  cold-blooded,  mat 
ter-of-fact  readers,  nothing  but  printed  paper  between 
boards;  just  as,  to  some  persons,  the  grandest  old  cathe 
dral,  with  its  fretwork  and  tracery,  is  only  a  pile  of  stone 
and  mortar,  and  the  music  of  Rubinstein  only  the  regu- 


340  BOOK  -  BUYING. 

lated  tinkling  of  piano  wires.  There  are  persons  who 
will  walk  down  the  finest  nave  in  Christendom  and  see 
there  no  poem  in  stone,  and  there  are  those  who  can 
gaze  on  the  superb  alcoves  of  Trinity  College  library, 
Cambridge,  without  an  emotion.  Of  such  a  man  we  may 
say,  in  the  language  of  Wordsworth: 

"A  primrose  by  the  river's  brim 
A  yellow  primrose  is  to  him, 
And  it  is  nothing  more." 

There  is  another  and  a  larger  class  of  readers,  who 
have  a  still  lower  esteem  for  books.  These  are  the  liellu- 
ones  librorum,  the  literary  gluttons,  who  devour  whole 
libraries,  and  prize  books  only  as  a  means  of  amusement, 
or  of  killing  time.  Volumes  of  history,  novels,  travels,  to 
these  men  are  mere  mile-posts  to  a  swift  and  hurried 
traveller.  When  they  close  a  work,  they  have  the  same 
hazy,  confused  recollection  of  its  contents  that  a  passenger 
in  a  "lightning-express"  railway  train  has  of  the  brooks, 
meadows,  hills,  dales,  and  other  objects,  by  which  he  has 
been  whirled.  Each  volume  they  race  through  acts  as  a 
sponge  to  wipe  out  the  impressions  made  by  its  predeces 
sors.  Readers  of  this  stamp  have  even  less  real  love  for 
books  than  the  utilitarians  first  mentioned.  They  never 
say  with  Macaulay:  "I  have  no  pleasure  from  books 
which  equals  that  of  reading  over  for  the  hundredth 
time  great  productions  which  I  know  almost  by  heart." 
They  never  say  of  these  silent  teachers,  with  DeBury: 
"  Hi  sunt  magistri  qui  nos  instruunt  sine  vergis  et  ferula, 
sine  verbis  et  colera,  sine  pane  et  pecunia " ;  nor  will  you 
ever  catch  them  exclaiming,  as  did  Theodore  Beza  to  his 
loved  volumes: 

"Salvete,  incoluines  mei  libelli, 
Meae  deliciae,  meae  salutes!" 


BOOK  -  BUYING.  341 

With  all  such  users  of  books,  who  are  indifferent  to 
their  dress, —  whether  grim  utilitarians,  who  prize  only 
their  thoughts,  or  pleasure-hunters  who  read  to  avoid 
thought, —  we  have  no  sympathy,  yet  no  quarrel.  With 
Horace,  we  bid  them  stultos  esse  libenter,  and  wish  them, 
in  the  words  of  the  Archbishop  of  Granada  to  Gil  Bias. 
"  all  sorts  of  prosperity,  with  a  little  more  taste."  We 
envy  not  the  disposition  that  leads  a  man  to  prize  not 
the  jewel  more  for  its  brilliant  setting;  that  looks  upon 
books  over  which  the  eye  has  hung  from  childhood  as 
mere  bricks  in  a  wall,  and  that,  without  a  pang  or  sigh, 
could  replace  them  by  others  from  the  nearest  shop. 
Almost  every  man  has  his  hobby, — his  pet  taste, —  which 
he  loves,  at  whatever  cost  of  time  or  money,  to  gratify. 
The  hobby  of  one  man  is  shells;  another  spends  all  his 
spare  cash  for  pictures;  a  third  doats  on  old  coins;  a 
fourth,  on  bugs  and  butterflies;  and  a  fifth  rides  a  musical 
hobby,  and  goes  merrily  through  the  world  to  the  sound 
of  fiddle,  flute,  French  horn,  and  double  bass.  The  hobby 
of  another  is  books, —  books  old  and  new,  in  vellum  and 
in  calf,  gilt-edged  and  marbled,  with  headbands  and  with 
out, —  with  which,  perhaps,  he  packs  his  cases,  loads  his 
what-nots,  stuffs  his  drawers,  and  piles  his  floors,  till  his 
whole  house  becomes  a  library,  a  wilderness  of  books !  He 
is  a  black-letter  man,  or  a  tall  copyist,  or  an  uncut  man,  or 
a  rough-edged  man,  or  an  early-dramatist,  or  an  Elzevirian, 
or  a  broadsider,  or  a  pasquinader,  or  a  tawny  moroccoite, 
or  a  gilt- topper,  or  a  marbled  insider,  or  an  editio  princeps 
man,  or  any  other  of  the  innumerable  species  which  the 
author  of  "The  Book-Hunter"  has  defined.  Who  will 
say  that  this  is  not  as  innocent  a  hobby  as  any  of  the  list? 

It  is  true  that  the  book-hunter, —  the  mere  bibliomane 


342  BOOK  -  BUYING. 

or  bibliotaphe,  as  distinguished  from  the  bibliophile,  the 
true  lover  of  books, —  is  often  an  utter  stranger  to  the 
contents  of  the  volumes  he  amasses; 

"Horace  he  has  hy  many  different  hands, 
But  not  one  Horace  that  he  understands." 

It  was  a  genuine  bibliomane  who  is  reported  to  have  said 
contemptuously  of  a  well-known  scholar,  — "  He  know 
about  books!  Nothing,  nothing  at  all,  I  assure  you, 
unless,  perhaps,  about  their  insides"  The  value  of  a 
book,  with  this  class,  lies  solely  in  its  rarity,  and  they 
feel  as  did  the  English  auctioneer,  who,  when  the  high 
bids  at  a  book  sale  began  to  slacken,  remonstrated  pathetic 
ally:  "Going  so  low  as  thirty  shillings,  gentlemen, —  this 
curious  book, —  so  low  as  thirty  shillings,  and  quite  imper 
fect.1'1  While  we  can  pardon  these  enthusiasts,  and  even 
the  bibliognostes,  who  are  learned  only  in  title-pages 
and  editions,  and  presses,  and  places  of  issue,  we  enter 
tain  no  such  feeling  toward  the  bibliotaphes,  long-pursed 
wretches,  who  get  possession  of  a  unique  copy  and  lock 
it  up.  "  There  were  known,"  says  Mr.  Burton,  in  his 
admirable  volume,  "  The  Book-Hunter,1'  "  to  be  just  two 
copies  of  a  spare  quarto,  called  '  Rout  upon  Rout,  or  the 
Rabblers  Rabbled,'  by  Felix  Nixon,  Gent.  A  certain  col 
lector  possessed  one  copy;  the  other,  by  indomitable  per 
severance,  he  also  got  hold  of,  and  then  his  heart  was 
glad  within  him;  and  he  felt  it  glow  with  well-merited 
pride  when  an  accomplished  scholar,  desiring  to  complete 
an  epoch  in  literary  history  on  which  that  book  threw  some 
light,  besought  the  owner  to  allow  him  a  sight  of  it,  were 
it  but  for  a  few  minutes,  and  the  request  was  refused.  '  I 
might  as  well  ask  him,'  said  the  animal,  who  was  rather 
proud  of  his  firmness  than  ashamed  of  his  churlishness, 


BOOK  -  BUYING.  343 

'  to  make  me  a  present  of  his  brains  and  reputation.'  " 
It  is  said  the  same  fiendish  spirit  sometimes  enters  the  mild 
bosom  of  the  Dutch  tulip  fancier;  and  he  has  been  known 
to  pay  thousands  of  dollars  for  a  duplicate  tuber,  that  he 
may  have  the  satisfaction  of  crushing  it  beneath  his  heel. 
Dibdin  warmed  his  convivial  guests  at  a  fire  fed  by  the 
wood-cuts  which  had  been  printed  from  in  the  impression 
of  the  "  Bibliographical  Decameron,"  so  that  the  sub 
scribers  to  his  costly  volumes  might  not  be  troubled  with 
the  ghost  of  a  doubt  that  poor  men  would  ever  partici 
pate  in  their  privilege. 

The  prices  which  bibliomanes .  are  sometimes  reported 
as  paying  for  their  coveted  treasures  almost  stagger  be 
lief.  At  the  sale  of  Mr.  Perkins's  library,  in  London,  in 
1873,  a  "first  folio"  of  Shakspeare  sold  for  £585;  Chris 
tine  de  Pisan's  "  Cent  Histories  de  Troie,"  an  "  exquisite 
vellum  manuscript  full  of  miniatures,"  was  knocked 
down  for  £650;  and  a  fine  manuscript  copy  of  John 
Lydgate's  "Siege  of  Troy,"  for  £1,620!  But  the  most 
"  fabulous "  price  was  that  paid  on  the  last  day  of  the 
sale  for  a  vellum  copy  of  the  famous  Gutenberg  and 
Fust  Bible,  of  which  only  eight  other  copies  are  known 
to  exist.  For  this  precious  book, — "  the  most  important 
and  distinguished  work  in  the  annals  of  typography," — 
the  first  edition  of  the  Holy  Scriptures, —  the  first  book 
printed  with  movable  metal  types  by  the  inventors  of  the 
art  of  printing, —  the  enormous  sum  of  £3,400  was  paid! 
Seventeen  thousand  dollar^  for  a  single  book!  —  enough 
money  to  buy  a  large  private  library.  This  surpasses  the 
sale,  made  'immortal  by  Dibdin,  of  the  copy  of  Boccaccio 
published  by  Valdarfer,  at  Venice,  in  1471.  The  sale  of 
the  Duke  of  Roxburgh's  library,  to  which  it  belonged, 


344  BOOK  -  BUYING. 

took  place  in  May,  1812,  and  lasted  forty-two  days. 
Among  the  distinguished  company  who  attended  the  sale 
were  the  Duke  of  Devonshire,  Earl  Spencer,  and  the  Duke 
of  Marlborough,  then  Marquis  of  Blandford.  The  Lid 
stood  at  five  hundred  guineas.  "A  thousand  guineas," 
said  Earl  Spencer.  "  And  ten,"  added  the  Marquis.  You 
might  have  heard  a  pin  drop.  All  eyes  were  turned, — 
all  breathing  well  nigh  stopped, —  every  sword  was  put 
home  within  its  scabbard,  except  that  which  each  of  these 
champions  brandished  in  his  valorous  hand.  "  Two  thou 
sand  pounds,"  said  the  Marquis.  The  Earl  Spencer  be 
thought  him  like  a  prudent  general  of  useless  bloodshed 
and  waste  of  powder,  and  had  paused  a  quarter  of  a 
minute,  when  Lord  Althorp  with  long  steps  came  to  his 
side,  as  if  to  bring  his  father  a  fresh  lance  to  renew  the 
fight.  Father  and  son  whispered  together,  and  Earl  Spen 
cer  exclaimed,  "Two  thousand  two  hundred  and  fifty 
pounds!"  An  electric  shock  went  through  the  assembly. 
"And  ten,"  quietly  added  the  Marquis.  This  ended  the 
strife.  Mr.  Evans,  ere  he  let  the  hammer  fall,  paused;  the 
ebony  instrument  seemed  to  be  charmed  or  suspended  "  in 
mid  air";  the  spectators  stood  aghast  when  the  hammer 
fell,  and  the  echo  of  its  fall  sounded  on  the  farthest  shores 
of  Italy.  The  tap  of  that  hammer  was  heard  in  the  libra 
ries  of  Rome,  Milan,  and  Venice.  Boccaccio  started  in  his 
sleep  of  five  hundred  years,  and  M.  Van  Praet  groped 
in  vain  amidst  the  royal  alcoves  in  Paris,  to  detect  a 
copy  of  the  famed  Valdarfer  Boccaccio.* 

The  most  discouraging  feature  of  the  mania  for  book- 
collecting  is,  that  it  grows  by  what  it  feeds  on,  and  be 
comes  the  more  insatiable  the  more  it  is  gratified.  It  is 

*Dibdin's  "Bibliographical  Decameron." 


BOOK  -  BUYIHG  345 

hard  for  ordinary  book-lovers  to  comprehend  a  desire  for 
books  so  devouring  as  that  which  consumed  Richard 
Heber.  The  number  of  his  books  was  stated  in  six  fig 
ures,  'and  the  catalogue  of  them  filled  five  thick  octavo 
volumes.  He  built  a  library  at  his  house  in  Hodnet, 
which  was  said  to  be  full.  His  residence  at  Pimlico, 
London,  was  filled,  like  Magliabecchi's  at  Florence,  with 
books  from  the  top  to  the  bottom, —  every  chair,  table, 
and  passage  containing  piles  of  erudition.  He  had  an 
other  house  in  York  street,  laden  from  the  ground  floor 
to  the  garret  with  curious  books.  He  had  a  library  in 
High  street,  Oxford;  an  immense  library  in  Paris;  an 
other  at  Antwerp;  another  at  Brussels;  another  at  Ghent; 
and  yet  others  at  other  places  in  the  Low  Countries  and 
in  Germany.  When  any  one  raised  a  cui  bono  query  of 
wonder  at  this,  his  answer  was  ready:  "Why,  sir,  you 
see  no  man  can  comfortably  do  without  three  copies  of  a 
book.  One  he  must  have  for  a  show-copy,  and  he  will 
probably  keep  it  at  his  country-house;  another  he  will 
require  for  his  own  use  and  reference;  and,  unless  he  is 
inclined  to  part  with  this,  which  is  very  inconvenient,  or 
risk  the  injury  of  his  best  copy,  he  must  needs  have  a 
third  at  the  service  of  his  friends." 

It  is  said  that,  some  years  ago,  a  book-hunting  Arch 
deacon  in  England,  going  up  to  London  to  be  examined 
on  some  question  before  the  House  of  Commons,  suddenly 
disappeared,  with  all  his  money  in  his  pocket,  and  his 
friends,  with  many  misgivings  of  foul  play,  wondered 
what  had  become  of  him.  Suddenly  he  returned  home 
one  day,  penniless,  followed  by  a  wagon  containing  three 
hundred  and  seventy-two  copies  of  rare  editions  of  the 
Bible.  Who  will  judge  harshly  of  a  case  like  this?  How 


346  BOOK  -  BUYING. 

glaring  the  contrast  between  the  victim  of  such  a  mania 
and  the  de  grege  Epicuri  porous,  who  squanders  his  money 
upon  the  luxuries  of  the  table,  or  him  who  wastes  it  upon 
ostentatious  upholstery, —  upon  wall-papers  that  cost  $3  a 
roll,  or  carpets  that  cost  $5  a  yard! 

But  is  there  no  cure  for  the  disease?  None  that  we 
have  heard  of,  except  downright  "  impecuniosity."  It  is, 
indeed,  hydra-headed;  extirpate  one  of  its  manifestations, 
and  it  crops  out  in  fifty  new  forms  and  ways.  Generally 
it  rages  more  and  more  fiercely  in  the  patient,  until  he 
has  gathered  together  more  books,  and  "things  in  books 
clothing,"  as  Lamb  calls  them,  than  he  can  find  conven 
ient  room  for;  or,  if  he  has  wisely  collected  on  some 
single  branch  of  literature  or  science,  he  finds,  sooner  or 
later,  an  impenetrable  barrier  to  the  progress  of  his 
hobby,  with  whatever  spirit  he  may  spur  its  stuffed  sides. 
He  opens  his  eyes  some  day  to  the  fact  that,  although 
one  book,  and  yet  another,  and  another,  fill  but  little 
space,  yet  an  aggregate  of  volumes  may  clamor  as  loudly 
for  more  room  as  an  aggregate  of  more  vulgar  wares, 
and  that  heaps  of  books  never  read  nor  consulted  may 
be  as  much  in  the  way  as  heaps  of  other  lumber.  If  he 
lives  in  a  hired  house,  this  fact  is  more  deeply  impressed 
on  his  mind  by  a  migratory  May-day;  soon  after  which, 
if  he  can  screw  up  his  courage  to  the  sticking-point,  he 
ransacks  his  hecatombs  of  musty  old  tomes,  prunes  out 
those  which  are  dear  to  him  as  "the  ruddy  drops  that 
visit  his  sad  heart,1'  and  packs  off  the  rest  to  an  auction 
room,  to  be  fought  for  by  a  fresh  horde  of  enthusiastic 
bibliomaniacs. 


A  PINCH  OF  SNUEF, 


"Scent  to  match  thy  rich  perfume, 
Chymic  art  did  ne'er  presume. 
Through  her  quaint  alembic  strain, 
None  so  sovereign  to  the  brain." 

SO  sings  the  quaint,  dear,  gentle  Elia,  in  his  chaunt 
to  the  Virginia  weed;  and  a  passionate  lover  of  it 
he  was,  in  all  its  witching  forms  of  pigtail,  roll,  and 
titillating  dust.  How  ardent  was  his  devotion  to  the 
plant,  is  well  known  to  all  who  have  read  his  "  Farewell 
to  Tobacco,"  in  which,  after  ironically  abusing  it  with 
all  sorts  of  hard  names,  he  abruptly  turns  traitor  (a  good 
traitor)  to  the  side  he  had  espoused,  and,  archly  declaring 
his  hatred  was  but  feigned,  concludes  by  asserting  his 
resolve  still  to  retain 

" —  a  seat  'mong  the  joys 
Of  the  bless'd  tobacco  boys," 

where,  though  he  may  be  debarred  by  sour  physician  the 
full  luxury  of  the  plant,  he  yet 

"—  may  catch 

Some  collateral  sweets,  and  snatch 
Sidelong  odours,  that  give  life 
Like  glances  from  a,  neighbor's  wife." 

The  struggle  which  Lamb  has  so  vividly  depicted, 
between  his  love  for  tobacco  and  his  acquiescence  in  the 
necessity  which  severed  him  from  it,  is  one  through  which 
millions  of  human  beings  have  passed;  and,  almost  invari 
ably,  with  the  same  result.  Who,  that  ever  fell  under 

347 


348  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

the  sorcery  of  the  weed,  has  not  again  and  again  resolved 
to  escape  from  its  spell, —  racking  the  vocabulary  for 
epithets  with  which  to  curse  it,  and  yet  again  and 
again  yielding  to  the  siren,  affirming 

"'Twas  but  in  a  sort  I  blamed  thee, 
None  e'er  prospered  who  defamed  thee." 

If  logic  and  learning,  satire  and  eloquence,  could  "  kill  off" 
a  plant,  tobacco  would  ages  ago  have  ceased  to  be  chewed, 
smoked,  or  snuffed.  Alphonse  Karr  declares  that,  had  it 
been  a  useful  plant,  it  could  never  have  survived  the 
assaults  made  upon  it.  Had  any  statesman,  he  adds, 
before  tobacco  was  discovered,  proposed,  for  the  purposes 
of  revenue,  to  introduce  so  nauseous  and  poisonous  an 
article  among  the  people;  had  he  declared  it  his  intention 
to  offer  it  for  sale,  chopped  up  into  pieces,  or  reduced 
to  powder,  telling  them  that  the  consequences  of  chewing, 
snuffing,  or  smoking  it  would  be  only  heart-pains,  stomach- 
pains,  vertigoes,  cholics,  convulsions,  vomitings  of  blood, 
etc., —  that's  all;  the  project  would  have  been  ridiculed  as 
absurd.  "My  good  friend,"  would  have  been  the  reply 
of  every  sane  listener  to  the  scheme,  "  nobody  will  dis 
pute  with  you  the  privilege  of  selling  a  thing  of  which 
there  will  be  no  buyers.  You  would  have  a  far  better 
chance  of  success,  should  you  open  a  shop  and  write 
over  it 

KICKS  ARE  SOLD  HERE! 

or 

HORSEWHIPPINGS   SOLD  HERE, 
"WHOLESALE  AND  RETAIL." 

And  yet  the  speculation  has  succeeded,  and  tobacco  and 
its  praises  are  in  almost  every  man's  mouth.  Kings  have 
forbidden  it;  popes  have  anathematized  it;  physicians  have 
warned  against  it;  and  even  clergymen  have  thundered 


A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  349 

their  denunciations  of  it  from  the  pulpit;  but  in  spite 
of  declamations,  and  "  counterblasts,"  and  sarcasms,  it 
continues  to  be  rooted  in  the  affections  of  its  votaries, 
who  greet  it  with  the  cry  — 

"Hail,  sole  cosmopolite,  Tobacco,  hail! 

Shag,  long-cut,  short-cut,  pigtail,  quid,  or  roll, 
Dark  Negrohead,  or  Orinooka  pale, 
In  every  form  congenial  to  the  soul." 

Gentle  reader,  we  are  no  slave  of  the  weed;  but,  should 
we  ever  become  one,  as  in  our  weakness  we  may,  we 
shall  have  a  decided  choice  as  to  the  form  of  our  servitude, 
and  shall  incline  to  the  powdered  article  as  the  least 
objectionable  to  our  senses.  Chant  as  you  may  the  praises 
of  chewing  and  smoking,  they  are  but  wretched  ways  of 
extracting  the  juices  of  the  plant,  and,  if  for  no  other 
reason,  would  be  without  a  charm  to  us,  by  the  vulgar 
commonness  to  which  they  are  degraded.  Inconvenient 
and  laborious,  they  are  at  the  same  time  uncleanly,  offensive 
to  one  (and  that  the  better)  half  of  humanity,  and,  it  is 
hardly  too  much  to  say,  that  no  man  who  is  addicted  to 
them  can  expect-to-rate  as  a  gentleman. 

But  snuff-taking  is  not  only  a  more  delicate  and  refined 
operation  per  se,  but  the  number  and  character  of  those 
engaged  in  it  show  it  to  be  at  once  a  dignified  and  an 
aristocratic  practice.  It  requires  a  certain  fineness  and 
delicacy  of  perception  to  apprehend  the  virtues  of  fine 
Spanish;  and  hence  the  vulgar  part  of  the  community, 
whose  senses  take  cognizance  of  the  coarser  scents  and 
substances, —  who  dine  off  the  most  strongly-flavored  dishes, 
and,  when  they  drink,  want  their  wine  brandied,  every 
glass  a  headache, —  almost  universally  "turn  up  their 
noses"  at  the  pleasures  of  the  box.  Add  to  this,  that 


350  A    PINCH    OF   SNUFF. 

snuff- takers  are,  almost  entirely,  a  serious,  reflecting  race; 
no  men  know  better  than  they  that  things  are  not  always 
what  they  seem  at  first  blush,  and  that  it  is  dangerous 
to  approach  to  an  examination  of  them  bluntly  and  with 
uncleared  optics.  A  snuff-taker,  before  he  looks  into  any 
grave  question,  is  careful  to  take  his  pinch;  and  then,  as 
Leigh  Hunt  observes,  if  any  fallacy  comes  before  him,  he 
shakes  the  imposture,  like  the  remnant  of  the  pinch,  to 
atoms,  with  one  "flesh-quake"  of  head,  thumb,  and  indif 
ference.  Or  should  he  "  look  into  some  little  nicety  of 
question  or  of  creation, —  of  the  intellectual  or  the  visible 
world, —  he,  having  sharpened  his  eyesight  with  another 
pinch,  and  put  his  head  into  proper  cephalick  condition, 
discerns  it,  as  it  were,  microscopically,  and  pronounces 
that  there  is  '  more  in  it  than  the  un- snuff-taking  would 
suppose.' "  Hence,  doubtless,  it  is,  that  the  phrase  "  up 
to  snuff"  is  a  synonym  for  keenness  and  quickness  of 
intellectual  vision. 

But  it  is  not  merely  on  philosophical  grounds  that  we 
prefer  this  form  of  using  tobacco.  It  has  authority  in 
its  favor.  If  we  turn  over  the  pages  of  modern  biog 
raphy,  we  shall  find  hardly  a  man  whose  name  has  been 
emblazoned  high  on  fame's  scroll,  that  was  not  a  votary 
of  snuff.  Talleyrand  used  to  declare  that  diplomacy  was 
impossible  without  it.  It  was  indispensable,  he  argued, 
to  politicians,  as  it  gives  them  time  for  thought  in  answer 
ing  awkward  questions  while  pretending  only  to  indulge 
in  a  pinch.  Among  his  snuff-boxes  was  one  which  was 
double,  being  two  snuff-boxes  joined  together  by  a  com 
mon  bottom.  The  one  was  politely  offered  to  his  acquaint 
ance;  the  other,  never  to  be  profaned  by  the  finger  and 
thumb  of  a  second  person,  was  reserved  for  himself, —  a 


A    PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  351 

precaution  in  which  we  recognize  the  arch-diplomate, 
who  was  so  eternally  on  his  guard,  that,  when  a  lady 
requested  his  autograph,  he  wrote  his  name  on  the  very 
top  of  the  sheet  of  paper  handed  to  him.  Pope  tells  us, 
in  his  "  Key  to  the  Lock,1'  that  the  Prince  Eugene  was 
a  great  taker  of  snuff  as  well  as  of  towns.  Frederic  the 
Great  had  a  collection  of  1,500  snuff-boxes,  and  he  loved 
the  dust  so  well  that  he  had  capacious  pockets  made  to 
his  waistcoat,  to  get  at  it  readily.  "  Glorious  John  Dry- 
den"  was  a  liberal  patron  of  snuff,  and  in  his  later 
years,  was  peculiarly  fastidious  in  the  article,  abhorring 
all  ordinary  snuffs,  and  satisfied  only  with  a  mixture 
which  he  himself  prepared.  When  from  his  chair  in 
Will's  Coffee  House  he  issued  those  literary  decrees  which 
ruled  the  judgment  of  the  town,  he  was  never  without 
the  stimulant;  and  for  a  young  author,  on  visiting  Will's, 
to  receive  a  pinch  from  Dryden's  snuff-box,  was  equiva 
lent  to  a  formal  admission  into  the  society  of  wits.  It 
has  been  said  that  you  might  as  soon  divorce  the  idea 
of  the  Popes,  Steeles,  and  Voltaires,  from  their  wigs  and 
caps,  as  from  their  snuff-boxes. 

Beau  Brummell,  who  so  long  was  the  glass  of  fashion, 
had  a  gorgeous  collection  of  snuff-boxes,  and  was  distin 
guished  for  the  grace  with  which  he  opened  the  lid  of 
his  box,  with  the  thumb  of  the  hand  that  carried  it, 
while  he  delicately  took  his  pinch  with  two  fingers  of 
the  other.  His  claim  to  be  the  leader  of  the  beau  monde 
was  based  not  more  on  his  walk,  his  coat,  and  his  cra 
vat,  than  on  the  inimitable  and  distingue  manner  with 
which, —  snatching  "a  grace  beyond  the  reach  of  art," — 
he  indulged  in  the  "  nasal  pastime,"  as  his  biographer 
terms  it,  of  taking  snuff.  The  great  literary  leviathan, 


352  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

Dr.  Johnson,  was  fond  of  the  delicious  dust;  and  so  lavish 
was  he  in  the  use  of  it,  that  he  was  wont  to  take  it 
from  a  waistcoat  pocket,  instead  of  from  a  box.  The 
gloom  of  his  life  might  have  deepened  into  a  profounder 
melancholy,  had  he  not  cheated  its  ennui  by  frequent 
pinches  of  snuff,  as  well  as  draughts  from  the  tea-kettle 
that  was  "  never  dry."  Sir  Joshua  Reynolds  had  a  keen 
zest  for  this  stimulant,  and  we  know  not  how  much  the 
exquisite  beauty  of  his  pictures  may  be  owing  to  the 
clearness  which  it  gave  to  his  brain  and  his  optics. 
When  bored  with  talk  about  "  Raphael,  Correggio,  and 
stuff,1'  by  canting  ignoramuses  whose  shallowness  his  old- 
fashioned  politeness  would  not  allow  him  to  ridicule,  he 
found  a  ready  resource  in  his  box: 

"  He  shifted  his  trumpet,  and  only  took  snuff." 

Scott,  though  he  may  not  have  carried  it  with  him, 
was  yet  fond  of  an  occasional  pinch;  and  Cowper,  as  all 
know,  rescued  an  hour  from  melancholy  to  hymn  the 
praises  of  his  favorite  weed.  It  is  recorded  of  the  ele 
gant  historian,  Gibbon,  that,  when  about  to  say  a  good 
thing,  he  was  wont  to  announce  it  by  a  complacent  tap 
on  his  snuff-box.  In  the  silhouette,  the  profile  cut  out 
with  scissors,  which  faces  the  title-page  of  his  "  Memoirs," 
he  is  represented  as  indulging  his  habit,  and  looking,  as 
Colman  says, 

"  Like  an  erect  black  tadpole,  taking  snuff." 

Narrating  his  journey  to  Turin,  and  his  presentation  at 
Court  there  at  the  age  of  twenty-seven,  the  historian 
says:  "The  most  sociable  women  I  have  met  with  are  the 
King's  daughters.  I  chatted  for  about  a  quarter  of  an 
hour  with  them,  talked  about  Lausanne,  and  grew  so 


A    PINCH   OF   SNURF.  353 

very  free  and  easy  that  I  drew  my  snuff-box,  rapped  it, 
took  snuff  twice  (a  crime  never  known  before  in  the 
presence  chamber),  and  continued  my  discourse  in  my 
usual  attitude  of  my  body  bent  forward  and  my  forefinger 
stretched  out."  Napoleon  was  a  famous  snuff-taker,  and, 
on  the  eve  of  battle,  always  stimulated  his  thinking 
powers  by  extra  quantities  of  the  pulverized  weed.  Can 
ning  attributed  to  it  half  his  own  victories:  "  Would  you 
confute  your  opponent  in  argument?"  said  he;  "learn  to 
take  snuff,  and  turn  your  back!"  —  a  style  of  reproof 
which  we  have  seen  most  felicitously  practised.  Henry 
Clay  loved  a  good  pinch ;  and  during  one  of  his  fiercest 
encounters  with  Calhoun,  which  we  witnessed  some  years 
ago,  in  the  United  States  Senate,  when  the  two  giants 
measured  swords  with  each  other  some  half-dozen  times, 
we  noticed  that  he  uniformly,  each  time  he  advanced  to 
the  onset,  roused  and  stimulated  himself  to  the  height  of 
his  great  argument  by  drawing  on  the  snuff-box  of  the 
nearest  Senator. 

It  is  said  that  some  one  who  was  a  little  skeptical 
about  Tom  Moore's  originality,  once  asked  him  whence 
he  had  derived  a  particularly  brilliant  sentiment  in  one 
of  his  songs.  "  Why,  I  got  it,"  replied  the  poet,  at  the 
same  moment  priming  his  nose  with  a  stiff  pinch,  "  I  got 
it  where  I  got  all  the  rest,  to  be  sure,  at  Lundy  Foot's 
shop."  The  poet  Crabbe  was  an  ardent  votary  of  snuff; 
and,  doubtless,  we  owe  many  a  fine  domestic  picture  to 
the  stimulus  of  a  pinch.  We  are  told  that  Dr.  Parr,  too, 
—  that  famous  incarnation  of  Greek  and  Latin, —  fond  as 
he  was  of  smoking  (consuming  forty  pipes  a  day,  accord 
ing  to  some  authorities),  was  not  niggard  in  the  use  of 
snuff.  We  have  already  spoken  of  Charles  Lamb:  it  is 


354  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

said  that  if  a  person  took  snuff  heartily,  that  alone  was 
enough  to  commend  him  to  Lamb's  acquaintance.  He 
would  understand,  by  analogy,  the  pungency  of  other 
things  besides  Irish  blackguard  or  Scotch  rappee.  A 
modern  essayist,  who  passed  "  a  day  of  happy  hours " 
alone  with  Lamb  at  Islington,  speaks  of  his  wild  way 
ward  words  of  wonder  as  to  the  sort  of  snuff  he  would 
meet  with  in  the  Elysium, —  and  the  faint  stutterings  of 
joy  with  which  he  anticipated  offering  to  old  Burton  a 
fine  pinch  of  Spanish,  as  pungent  as  his  own  wit. 
Doubtless  he  never  would  have  written  his  "Farewell 
to  Tobacco,"  had  he  used  it  only  in  the  powdered  form, 
instead  of  learning  to  puff  the  coarser  weed  "  by  toil 
ing  after  it  as  some  men  toil  after  virtue."  Sydney 
Smith,  describing  the  French  savant,  says  it  is  curious  to 
see  in  what  little  apartments  he  lives;  "you  find  him  at 
his  books,  covered  with  snuff,  with  a  little  dog  that  bites 
your  legs."  Butler  has  noted  that  the  saints  of  Crom 
well's  time  were  not  averse  to  snuff.  He  says  of  one: 

"  He  had  administered  a  dose 
Of  snuff  mundungus  to  his  nose; 
And  powdered  the  inside  of  his  skull 
Instead  of  the  outward  jobbernole." 

In  short,  few  great  or  good  men  have  lived  since  the 
introduction  of  the  weed,  who  have  not  consumed  it  in 
this  form;  and  to  have  deprived  them  of  the  excitement 
which  their  snuff-boxes  afforded  would  have  been,  there 
is  reason  to  believe,  not  only  to  lessen  their  happiness 
and  sour  their  tempers,  but  to  rob  them  in  a  great  de 
gree  of  their  powers  of  reflection. 

Again,  the  snuff-box  is  a  powerful  auxiliary  to  social 
intercourse  and  enjoyment.  By  what  subtle,  mysterious 
influence  it  operates,  we  know  not;  but  who  has  not  no- 


A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  355 

ticed  the  almost  miraculous  effect  of  a  little  Maccaboy  in 
"  breaking  the  ice "  and  banishing  the  freezing  formali 
ties  of  a  mixed  company,  when  gracefully  tendered  by 
one  of  their  number?  Who  has  not  observed  also  what 
a  bond  of  union,  what  an  isthmus  of  communication,  the 
snuff-box  is  among  travelers,  even  foreigners  who  know 
not  each  other's  language;  how  quickly  the  heart  opens 
to  the  open  box  of  a  true  gentleman,  of  whatever  coun 
try  he  be,  or  however  humble  his  station?  The  snuff 
box  has  been  a  powerful  engine  even  in  Presidential  elec 
tions,  and  it  is  hardly  an  exaggeration  to  say  that  to  it 
some  of  our  Chief  Magistrates  have  owed  their  elevation 
to  office.  When  Madison  was  candidate  for  that  dignity, 
and  was  assailed  with  the  utmost  vehemence  of  party 
rage,  the  polite  attentions  of  Mrs.  Madison  to  the  chiefs 
of  all  parties,  who  met  in  social  intercourse  at  her  house, 
did  wonders  towards  softening  the  asperities  of  party 
spirit  at  the  Capital,  and  electing  her  husband  to  the 
Presidency.  Her  snuff-box,  in  particular,  had  a  magic 
influence,  and  its  titillating  dust  seemed  as  perfect  a  se 
curity  from  hostility  as  is  a  participation  of  bread-and- 
salt  among  some  savage  tribes.  The  kindly  feelings  thus 
cultivated  among  those  who  sneezed  together,  triumphed, 
we  are  told,  over  the  animosity  of  party  spirit,  and  won 
for  her  husband  a  popularity  to  which  his  lofty  reserve 
and  chilling  manners  would  have  been  an  insuperable 
obstacle.  The  handful  of  dust  with  which  Virgil  ends 
the  wars  of  the  bees,  but  typified  the  magic  power  of  her 
snuff-box: 

"Hi  motus  animorum,  atque  haec  certamina  tanta 
Pulvis  exigui  jactu  compressa  quiescunt." 

That    there    is    some    instinct    of    our    nature    which 


356  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

prompts  the  use  of  this  stimulus  is  proved  by  the  fact 
that  even  anti-tobacconists,  who  declaim  against  the  weed, 
are  guilty, —  unconsciously  to  themselves, —  of  the  exqui 
site  inconsistency  of  using  it  in  its  powdered  form.  How 
often  have  we  listened  to  a  vehement  tirade  against  to 
bacco,  while  ever  and  anon  the  orator  would  pull  out  a 
silver  snuff-box,  and  sandwich  between  his  sentences  a 
most  sternutatory  pinch!  In  the  reign  of  Louis  XIV, 
Fragon,  the  physician  of  the  grand  monarch,  having  to 
maintain  a  thesis  against  snuff  in  the  schools,  was  taken 
ill;  whereon  his  place  was  supplied  by  a  brother  medicus, 
who  read  the  thesis, —  taking  all  the  while  enormous 
quantities  of  snuff!  So  true  is  the  remark  of  Horace, 
that  you  may  pitchfork  Nature  out  of  your  presence,  but 

"  —  usque  recurret, 
Et  mala  perrumpet  furtim  fastidia  victrix." 

Few  things  are  more  interesting  than  to  notice  the 
different  ways  in  which  men  take  snuff.  A  thorough  and 
critical  knowledge  of  these  would,  no  doubt,  add  largely 
to  our  acquaintance  with  psychology,  and  perhaps  give 
us  a  profounder  insight  into  men's  characters, —  their 
secret  thoughts  and  hidden  motives  of  action, —  than 
physiognomy  or  phrenology.  On  this  head,  Leigh  Hunt 
observes,  with  his  usual  felicity,  that  "  some  men  take 
snuff  by  little  fits  and  starts,  and  get  over  the  thing 
quickly.  These  are  epigrammatic  snuff-takers,  who  come 
to  the  point  as  fast  as  possible,  and  to  whom  pungency 
is  everything.  They  generally  use  a  sharp  and  severe 
snuff,— a  sort  of  essence  of  pins'  points.  Others  are  all 
urbanity  and  polished  demeanor;  they  value  the  style  as 
much  as  the  sensation,  and  offer  the  box  around  them  as 
much  out  of  dignity  as  benevolence,  Some  take  snuff 


A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  357 

irritably,  others  bashfully,  others  in  a  manner  as  dry  as 
the  snuff  itself,  generally  with  an  economy  of  the  vege 
table;  others  with  a  luxuriance  of  gesture,  and  a  lavish- 
ness  of  supply,  that  announces  a  moister  article,  and 
sheds  its  superfluous  honors  over  neckcloth  and  coat. 
Dr.  Johnson's  was  probably  a  snuff  of  this  kind."  About 
a  century  ago  a  fashion  prevailed  among  snuff-takers  of 
administering  the  powder  to  the  nose  with  a  little  spoon 
or  ladle,  in  allusion  to  which  Samuel  Wesley  expressed 
a  fear  that  the  human  ear  would  not  long  remain  exempt 
from  its  application: 

"  To  such  a  height  with  some  is  fashion  grown, 
They  feed  their  very  nostrils  with  a  spoon; 
One,  and  but  one  degree,  is  wanting  yet 
To  make  their  senseless  luxury  complete; 
Some  choice  regale,  useless  as  snuff  and  dear, 
To  feed  the  mazy  windings  of  the  ear." 

But  to  leave  these  references  to  authority,  and  glance 
at  some  additional  advantages  of  snuff- taking:  —  what 
pleasure  is  there,  we  ask,  comparable  to  the  luxury  of  a 
sneeze?  We  love  a  good  laugh,  it  is  true,  and  agree 
with  Charles  Lamb  that  it  is  worth  a  hundred  groans  in 
any  state  of  the  market.  Its  delicious  alchemy  can  con 
vert  even  tears  into  the  quintessence  of  merriment,  and 
make  wrinkles  themselves  expressive  of  youth  and  frolic. 
But  who  will  pretend  that  it  sends  such  an  electric  thrill 
through  the  frame  as  a  sudden  sternutation?  The  former 
may  convulse  by  degrees;  but  it  is  the  last  only  which 
can  instantly  electrify  the  nerves,  brighten  every  sense, 
clear  away  the  cobwebs  from  the  brain,  and  give  the 
whole  system  a  shock  to  which  the  effect  of  the  voltaic 
pile  is  as  nothing.  Who,  that  has  ever  experienced  the 
titillating  sensation, —  at  least,  when  produced  artificially. 


358  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

—  can  forget  the  ecstatic  feelings  that   accompanied  and 
followed    the    paroxysm?     Truly    has    it    been    said    that 
"  one    seems    to   himself  suddenly  to  be  endowed  with  a 
sixth    sense,"    opening    to   him   a  world    of   wonders,   and 
teaching  him  to  contemplate  the  possession  of  a  thousand 
delicate  nerves  before  unthought  of.     Hardly  are  the  se 
ries  of  sneezes  over,  'ere  the  slight  premonitory  tickling 
at  the    nose   is  felt  again,  and  he  tries,  by  various  per 
suasive  arts,  to  coax  forth  another;    he  draws  his  breath 
through  his  nostrils, —  he  moves  his  head  to  and  fro  with 
an  ish-i, —  he  thinks  intensely  of  his  last  sneeze, —  when 
suddenly  the  titillation   begins  again,  and  away  he  goes, 

—  sn-sn-sneeze ! 

"  Sudden  with  starting  tears  each  eye  o'erflows, 
And  the  high  dome  re-echoes  to  the  nose!" 

According  to  a  late  writer  the  following  is  the  scien 
tific  explanation  of  a  sneeze:  —  The  nose  receives  three 
sets  of  nerves, —  the  nerves  of  smell,  those  of  feeling,  and 
those  of  motion.  The  first  communicate  to  the  brain  the 
odorous  properties  of  substances  with  which  they  may 
come  in  contact,  in  a  diffused  or  concentrated  state;  the 
second  communicate  the  impressions  of  touch;  the  third 
move  the  muscles  of  the  nose;  but  the  power  of  these 
muscles  is  very  limited.  When  a  sneeze  occurs  all  these 
faculties  are  excited  to  a  high  degree.  A  grain  of  snuff 
excites  the  olfactory  nerves,  which  dispatch  to  the  brain 
the  intelligence  that  "  snuff  has  attacked  the  nostril." 
The  brain  instantly  sends  a  mandate  through  the  motor 
nerves  to  the  muscles,  saying,  "Cast  it  out!"  and  the 
result  is  unmistakable.  So  offensive  is  the  enemy  besieg 
ing  the  nostril  held  to  be,  that  the  nose  is  not  left  to  its 
own  defense.  It  would  be  too  feeble  to  accomplish  this. 


A   PINCH  tfF  SNUFF.  359 

An  allied  army  of  muscles  join  in  the  rescue, —  nearly 
one-half  the  body  arouses  against  the  intruder, —  from 
the  muscles  of  the  lips  to  those  of  the  abdomen,  all  unite 
in  the  effort  for  the  expulsion  of  the  grain  of  snuff. 

A  modern  poet,  who,  though  he  would  doubtless  object 
to  having  his  nose  pulled,  yet  holds  it  ever  ready  for  a 
pinch,  has  the  following  picturesque  description  of  a 
sneeze: 

"What  a  moment!    What  a  doubt!  — 

All  my  nose,  inside  and  out, 

All  my  thrilling,  tickling,  caustic 

Pyramid  rhinocerostic 

Wants  to  sneeze,  and  cannot  do  it! 
Now  it  yearns  me,  thrills  me,  stings  me, 
Now  with  rapturous  torment  wrings  me; 

Now  says  l  Sneeze,  you  fool,  get  through  it.' 

What  shall  help  me?— Oh!  Good  Heaven! 

Ah  — yes,  thank  ye  —  Thirty-seven — 

Shee—shee  —  Oh,  'tis  most  del-^Ai 

Ishi— ishi  —  most  Ael-ishi 

(Hang  it!  I  shall  sneeze  till  spring) 

Snuff's  a  most  delicious  thing." 

Who  can  conceive  of  a  more  innocent  luxury  than  this? 
What  language,  then,  can  paint  the  cruelty  of  the  cynic 
who  would  rob  men  of  this  enjoyment?  —  as  did  Amu- 
rath  IV,  who,  in  1625,  forbade  his  subjects  the  use  of 
snuff  under  the  penalty  of  having  the  nose  cut  off;  and 
the  Grand  Duke  of  Moscow,  by  whom  the  Muscovite  who 
was  found  snuffing  was  condemned  to  have  his  nostrils 
split.  Pope  Urban  VIII  and  Innocent  XII  were  compar 
atively  excusable  when  they  anathematized  all  snuff- takers 
who  committed  the  heinous  sin  of  taking  a  pinch  in 
church;  nor  will  any  devotee  of  the  dust  execrate  the 
memory  of  "  Good  Queen  Bess,"  because  she  added  to  the 
penalty  of  excommunication  in  such  cases  by  authorizing 
the  parish  beadle  to  confiscate  the  snuff-box  to  his  own 


360  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

use.  These  were  harsh  penalties  for  so  trivial  an  offense; 
but  there  is  a  time  and  place  for  all  things;  and  absti 
nence  from  Maccaboy  during  the  hours  of  church  service, 
so  far  from  robbing  its  lover  of  any  pleasure  on  the 
whole,  would  only  give  a  finer  edge  to  his  subsequent 
enjoyment.  But  to  subject  men  to  the  death-penalty  for 
fche  use  of  snuff,- — to  bore  a  hole  through  their  noses,  as 
did  Mahomet  IV, —  to  compel  the  offenders,  as  once  did 
the  Shah  of  Persia,  to  expatriate  themselves  in  order  to 
enjoy  this  "virtuous  vice," — does  it  not  seem  a  stretch 
of  tyranny  too  violent  for  belief?  And  how  paltry  and 
picayunish  appear  the  calculations  of  such  minute  philos 
ophers  as  Lord  Stanhope,  who  estimated  that,  in  forty 
years  of  a  snuff-taker's  life,  two  entire  years  would  be 
spent  in  tickling  his  nose,  and  two  more  in  blowing  it, 
and  concluded  that  a  proper  application  of  the  time  and 
money  thus  lost  to  the  public  might  constitute  a  fund 
for  the  discharge  of  England's  national  debt!  Out  upon 
such  utilitarian  suggestions,  worthy  of  the  mean  "age  of 
calculators  and  economists ! "  Hearken  unto  Boswell,  as 
he  sings  in  his  "Shrubs  of  Parnassus": 

"O  snuff!  our  fashionable  end  and  aim, 
Strasburgh,  Rappee,  Dutch,  Scotch,  whate'er  thy  name; 
Powder  celestial!  quintessence  divine! 
New  joys  entrance  my  soul,  while  thou  art  mine. 
By  thee  assisted,  ladies  kill  the  day, 
And  breathe  their  scandal  freely  o'er  their  tea; 
Not  less  Ihfy  prize  thy  virtues  when  in  bed; 
One  pinch  of  thee  revives  the  vapored  head, 
Warms  in  the  sun,  refreshes  in  the  breeze, 
Glows  in  the  stars,  and  tickles  in  the  sneeze." 

Apropos  to  sneezing,  it  is  a  question  which  has  long 
tormented  the  wits  of  antiquaries,  whence  came  the  custom 
of  saying  "God  bless  you!"  to  one  who  sneezes.  Many 


A   PIKCH   OF   SNUFF.  361 

writers  ascribe  it  to  an  ordinance  of  Pope  St.  Gregory, 
at  whose  time  the  air  was  so  pestilential  that  they  who 
sneezed  instantly  expired.  On  this  the  pontiff,  it  is  said, 
instituted  a  short  benediction  to  be  pronounced  on  such 
persons,  to  save  them  from  the  fatal  effects  of  this  malig 
nancy.  The  Rabbins,  however,  declare  that  before  Jacob 
men  sneezed  but  once  in  a  lifetime,  and  then  immediately 
died;  and  that  the  memory  of  this  was  ordered  to  be  pre 
served  in  all  nations,  by  a  command  of  every  prince  to  his 
subjects  to  employ  some  salutary  exclamation  after  the  act 
of  sternutation.  Whatever  the  origin  of  the  custom,  it 
has  prevailed  among  all  nations,  and  was  found  to  exist 
even  in  the  New  World,  on  its  first  discovery  by  the 
Spaniards.  Among  the  ancients,  the  distinctions  made 
about  sneezing  raised  it  to  an  art;  for  while  it  was 
unlucky  in  the  afternoon,  or  when  men  were  clearing  away 
food,  or  if  it  occurred  three  times,  or  more  than  four,  or 
on  the  left-hand  side, —  if  it  occurred  among  persons  in 
deliberation,  or  two  or  four  times,  or  in  the  morning,  or  on 
the  right-hand  side,  it  was  accounted  a  lucky  omen.  We 
are  told  that  Themistocles,  by  a  judicious  sneeze  on  his 
right-hand  side,  persuaded  his  soldiers  to  fight,  and  Xeno- 
phon,  by  a  similar  act  in  the  middle  of  a  speech,  was 
elected  General.  On  another  occasion,  a  sneeze  from  a 
linesman  just  before  a  battle  was  considered  so  ominous 
that  public  prayers'were  deemed  necessary  in  consequence. 
An  old  writer  says  that  the  ancients  were  accustomed 
to  go  to  bed  again,  if  they  sneezed  while  putting  on  their 
shoes.  Catullus,  in  one  of  his  charming  poems,  makes 
Cupid  sneeze  his  approbation  of  two  lovers.  When  the 
King  of  Mesopotamia  sneezes,  he  is  greeted  with  shouts 
in  the  ante-chamber,  shouts  in  the  palace-yard,  and 
16 


362  A   PINCH   OF  SNUFF. 

shouts  in  the  city  streets,  echoed  and  reverberated  by 
a  thousand  loyal  voices.  Supposing  his  majesty  to  be 
an  inveterate  snuff-taker,  what  horrid  cries  must  rend 
the  air  of  his  capital  "from  morn  till  dewy  eve"! 
According  to  mythology,  the  first  sign  of  life  given  by 
Prometheus's  artificial  man  was  a  sneeze,  caused  by  the 
solar  rays  stealing  through  his  pores.  The  Siamese  wish 
long  life  to  persons  sneezing.  The  reason,  according  to 
Brande,  is,  they  believe  that  when  one  of  the  judges  of 
hell  opens  the  register  in  which  the  duration  of  men's 
lives  is  written,  and  looks  upon  any  particular  leaf,  all 
those  whose  names  chance  to  be  entered  on  it  never  fail 
to  sneeze  immediately.  In  Vienna,  if  one  sneezes  in  a  cafe, 
the  bystanders  will  doff  their  hats,  and  say  ".God  be  with 
you ! "  The  lower  class  of  modern  Romans  greet  a  sneezer 
with  the  salutation,  "May  you  have  male  children!" 
Milton  says  that  earthquakes, 

" —  though  mortals  fear  them 
As  dangerous  to  the  pillared  frame  of  heaven, 
Or  to  the  earth's  dark  basis  underneath, 
Are  to  the  main  as  inconsiderable 
And  harmless,  if  not  wholesome,  as  a  sneeze 
To  man's  less  universe,  and  soon  are  gone." 

Perhaps  the  most  terrific  sneeze  on  record  is  that  de 
scribed  by  Martelli,  an  Italian  writer,  in  his  Bambociata, 
or  Sneezing  of  Hercules,  a  marionette  farce,  from  which 
Swift  borrowed  the  idea  of  his  Voyage  to  Laputa.  In 
this  piece  Hercules  is  represented  as  reaching  the  land 
of  the  Pigmies,  who,  alarmed  at  the  sight  of  what  seems 
a  living  mountain,  hide  themselves  in  caves.  One  day, 
as  Hercules  is  sleeping  in  the  open  fields,  the  Pigmies 
venture  forth  from  their  hiding  places,  and,  armed  with 
boughs  and  thorns,  mount  the  sleeping  monster,  and 


A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  363 

cover  him  from  head  to  foot  like  flies  covering  a  piece 
of  raw  meat.  Hercules  awakes,  and,  feeling  something 
tickling  his  nose,  sneezes.  His  enemies  are  routed,  "  horse, 
foot,  and  dragoons,"  and  tumble  precipitately  from  his 
sides, —  when  the  curtain  falls,  and  the  piece  ends. 

A  powerful  argument  for  snuff-taking  in  preference 
to  other  modes  of  using  the  weed,  is,  that  one  does  not 
have  to  serve  a  long  and  disagreeable  apprenticeship  be 
fore  he  acquires  a  full  mastery  of  the  art  and  revels  in 
the  highest  pleasures  of  snuffing.  Unlike  the  tobacco- 
chewer  or  other  consumer  of  the  weed,  who  has  to  strug 
gle  heroically  through  its  repugnant  qualities  of  taste  and 
eifect,  until  by  habit  its  stimulus  grows  pleasurable  and 
the  system  gets  mithridated  against  the  poison,  the  snuff- 
taker,  at  the  very  threshold  of  his  career,  is  placed  on  a 
level  with  the  most  veteran  practitioners  of  the  art. 
Another  argument  for  this  form  of  the  weed  is,  that  the 
snuff- taker  is  rarely  guilty  of  such  outrageous  excesses  in 
its  use  as  are  habitual  with  the  chewer  and  the  smoker. 
The  lover  of  the  pipe  and  the  cigar  puffs  out  his  volumes 
of  smoke  from  dawn  till  bed-time, — 

"Faucibus  ingentem  fumum,  mirabile  dictu, 
Evomit  involvitque  domum  caligine  caeca"; 

the  devotee  of  raw  cavendish  "  chews  the  cud  of  sweet 
and  bitter  fancy"  from  the  moment  he  wakes  in  the 
morning  till  he  drops  to  sleep  at  night;  and  some 
wretches,  not  satisfied  with  this,  resort  to  what  is  called 
"plugging," — that  is,  thrusting  long  pellets  or  rolls  of 
tobacco  up  the  nose,  and  keeping  them  there  during  the 
entire  night.  Sir  Walter  Raleigh,  who  first  made  smok 
ing  fashionable  in  England,  was  a  type  of  the  whole 
tribe  of  smokers.  Though  an  elegant  courtier,  he  smoked 


364  A   PINCH    OF   SNUFF. 

to  the  disgust  of  the  ladies  at  court,  smoked  as  he  sat  to 
see  his  friend  Essex  perish  on  the  scaffold,  and  smoked 
just  before  he  went  to  the  scaffold  himself.  Eobert  Hall 
used  to  smoke  till  the  last  moment  before  ascending  the 
pulpit,  and  resumed  his  pipe  as  soon  as  he  came  down. 
When  a  friend  sought  to  convince  him  that  tobacco  was 
sapping  his  health,  he  replied:  "I  can't  answer  your 
arguments,  and  I  can't  give  up  my  pipe." 

That  snuff- taking  may  be,  and  is,  abused, —  that,  like 
all  other  innocent  enjoyments,  it  may  be  carried  to  such 
excess  as  to  undermine  the  health,  and  even  cause  death, 
—  is  true;  and  it  is  upon  this  abuse  that  all  the  argu 
ments  against  it  are  founded.  The  nose  is  the  emunctory 
of  the  brain,  and  when  its  functions  are  impeded,  the 
whole  system  of  the  head  is  deranged.  One  of  the  effects 
of  excessive  snuffing  is  to  deaden  the  nerves  of  the  nose, 
which  are  endowed  with  exquisite  sensibility,  and  traverse 
with  their  fine  net-work  the  entire  inner  membrane  of 
the  nostril.  Drying  up  the  secretion  which  lubricates 
this  membrane,  it  gradually  destroys  the  sense  of  smell, 
and  the  result  is,  that  of  all  the  pleasures  derived  from 
the  olfactory  organs, —  the  omnis  copia  narium,  as  Horace 
terms  it, —  the  snuff-taker  knows  as  little  as  if  he  were 
noseless.  Similar  effects  ensue  upon  the  saliva,  and  the 
sense  of  taste  is  blunted.  An  inveterate  snuff-taker  may 
always  be  recognized  by  his  brown,  sodden  complexion, — 
by  a  certain  nasal  twang  or  asthmatic  wheezing  when  he 
tries  to  speak, —  and  by  a  sort  of  disagreeable  noise  in 
respiration,  which  resembles  incipient  snoring.  Snuff, 
in  temperately  taken,  is  a  deadly  foe  to  the  memory. 
The  Abbe  Moigno,  an  eminent  French  savant,  who  in 
1861  took  twenty  grammes  a  day,  found  this  faculty 


A    PINCH    OF   SNUFF.  365 

rapidly  decaying  in  consequence  of  the  habit.  He  had 
learned  some  fifteen  hundred  root-words  in  each  of  several 
languages,  but  found  these  gradually  dropping  out  of  his 
mind,  so  as  to  necessitate  frequent  recurrence  to  diction 
aries.  Quitting  the  use  of  tobacco  in  all  its  forms,  he 
found,  after  six  years  of  abstinence,  that  his  memory  had 
recovered  all  its  riches,  all  its  sensibility.  The  army  of 
words,  which  had  run  away,  had  all  gradually  returned. 
Snuff,  taken  in  enormous  quantities,  also  causes  fleshy 
excrescences  in  the  nose,  tumors  and  polypi  in  the  throat, 
vomitings,  loss  of  appetite,  dyspepsia, — is  a  frequent  cause 
of  blindness,  and  is  said  to  induce  convulsions,  promote 
consumption,  and  even  to  cause  madness  and  death.  Na 
poleon's  death  is  attributed  to  a  morbid  state  of  the 
stomach,  superinduced  by  excessive  snuffing;  and  Dr. 
Rush  tells  us  that  Sir  John  Pringle,  who  was  afflicted 
with  tremors  in  his  hands  and  an  impaired  memory, 
through  the  use  of  snuff,  recovered  his  recollection  and 
the  use  of  his  hands  by  abandoning  the  dust  at  the  sug 
gestion  of  Dr.  Franklin.  As  if  this  catalogue  of  ills  to 
which  the  snuff-taker  is  liable  were  not  fearful  enough, 
other  imaginary  ones  have  been  added;  and  grave  doctors 
have  gone  so  far  as  to  declare  that  his  brain  will  be 
found  after  death  to  be  dried  to  a  sort  of  dirty  mem 
brane,  clogged  with  soot! 

These  facts,  however,  are  not  solid  objections  to  snuff 
itself;  they  only  show  that  it  may  be  taken  in  excess,  or 
may -not  be  suited  to  one's  peculiar  idiosyncrasies  of  con 
stitution  or  temperament.  Would  you  chop  off  men's 
fingers,  because  they  are  sometimes  pickers  and  stealers? 
Or  is  the  fact  that  some  men  make  gluttons  of  themselves 
an  argument  for  the  abolition  of  eating?  No  one  abstains 


366  A    PINCH    OF   SNUFF.    . 

from  veal  pie  because  a  greedy  fool  once  died  of  eating 
a  whole  calf;  and  the  excellence  of  sherry  at  dinner  is 
not  disputed  because  unlimited  Old  Bourbon  induces  de 
lirium  tremens.  There  are  men  so  strangely  constituted 
that  they  cannot  digest  even  lamb  or  mutton,  and  whom 
the  bare  sight  or  smell  of  certain  healthful  articles  of 
food  throws  into  spasms.  The  Duke  d'Epernon  fainted  at 
the  sight  of  a  leveret;  and  Marshal  de  Breze,  who  died 
in  1689,  swooned  at  the  sight  of  a  rabbit.  Erasmus  could 
not  smell  fish  without  being  thrown  into  a  fever,  and 
Scaliger  shuddered  in  every  limb  on  seeing  water-cresses 
Favoriti,  a  famous  Italian  poet,  could  not  bear  the  odoi' 
of  a  rose. 

The  gravest  objection  to  snuif  is  the  adulterations  to 
which  it  is  subjected.  When  adulterated,  as  it  too  often 
is,  with  pepper,  hellebore,  and  pulverized  glass,  to  give  it 
additional  pungency,  its  effects  must  be  anything  but  bene 
ficial.  Add  to  these  the  ferruginous  earths,  such  as  red 
and  yellow  ochre,  and  no  less  than  three  poisonous  prepa 
rations,  viz.:  chromate  of  lead,  red  lead,  and  bi-chromate 
of  potash, —  which,  according  to  the  London  "Lancet" 
Commission,  are  introduced  into  it, —  and  its  deleterious 
effects  are  frightfully  aggravated.  At  a  meeting  of  the 
Philosophical  Society  of  Manchester,  England,  Dr.  C.  Cal- 
vert  stated  that  he  had  recently  analyzed  several  samples 
of  snuff,  in  all  of  which  he  had  found  traces  of  red  lead, 
and  of  the  bi-chromate  of  potash,  which  is  still  more  fre 
quently  employed.  M.  Duchatel,  of  Paris,  found  that  a 
dose  from  one  twenty-fifth  to  one  five-hundredth  of  a 
grain  sufficed  to  destroy  a  dog.  Colic,  "  dropped  hands," 
and  other  forms  of  paralysis,  are  among  the  least  effects 
of  this  deadly  poison.  Statements  like  this  are  not  to  be 


A    PINCH    OF   SNUFF.  3671 

sneezed  at;  but,  added  to  the  fact  that  it  is  the  scented 
snuffs  that  are  most  unwholesome,  as  they  hide  the  adul 
teration,  and  that  it  is  not  unusual  to  save  the  sweepings 
of  tobacco-shops  and  warehouses,  even  the  bits  of  leaf 
that  adhere  to  the  shoes,  for  the  purpose  of  mixing  in 
snuff, —  must  make  even  the  most  hardened  and  incorri 
gible  snuffer  pause  ere  he  again  converts  his  nose  into  a 
dust-hole  and  a  soot-bag. 

Considering  how  the  practice  of  snuff-taking  tends  to 
spoil  the  complexion,  it  seems  strange  that  ladies  should 
ever  become  addicted  to  it.  The  fact  that,  by  the  drain 
of  the  juices,  it  tends  to  injure  the  muscles  of  the  face, 
to  furrow  and  corrugate  the  skin,  and  to  give  a  gaunt, 
withered,  and  jaundiced  appearance  to  "  the  human  face 
divine,"  would  be  enough,  one  would  think, —  saying  noth 
ing  of  damage  to  the  health, —  to  deter  any  woman  from 
touching  the  "  high-dried  pulvillio."  Yet  in  the  days  of 
Queen  Anne  and  Louis  XY,  as  we  have  already  hinted, 
the  practice  was  fashionable,  not  only  with  old  ladies, 
who  still  cling  to  it,  but  with  those  who  had  their  con 
quests  yet  to  make,  and  whom  time  had  not  begun  to 
rob  of  their  charms.  Leigh  Hunt  remarks  that  the 
ladies  in  the  time  of  the  Voltaires  and  the  Du  Chatelets 
seemed  never  to  think  themselves  either  too  old  to  love, 
or  too  young  to  take  snuff.  A  bridegroom  in  one  of  the 
British  essayists,  describing  his  wife's  fondness  for  rouge 
and  carmine,  complains  that  he  can  never  make  pure, 
unsophisticated  way  to  her  cheek,  but  is  obliged,  like  Pyr- 
amus  in  the  story,  to  kiss  through  a  wall, —  to  salute 
through  a  crust  of  paints  and  washes: 

"Wall,  vile  wall,  which  did  these  lovers  sunder." 

This,  it  has  been  well  observed,  "is  bad  enough;  yet  the 


368  A    PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

object  of  paint  is  to  imitate  health  and  loveliness;  the 
wish  to  look  well  is  in  it."  But  snuff !  what  a  death 
blow  does  it  give  to  all  that  romance  and  poetry  with 
which  man  delights  to  invest  the  other  sex!  How  vulgar 
the  thought  that  a  sneeze  should  interrupt  a  kiss  or  a 
sigh!  Fancy  a  young  beauty,  to  whom  her  lover  on  his 
knees,  after  a  protracted  and  sentimental  courtship,  has 
just  closed  a  tremulous  avowal  of  his  passion  with  the 
despairing  interrogatory,  "  C-a-n  I  1-i-v-e?"  sneezing  out, 
at  this  very  pinch  of  the  game,  what  would  otherwise  be 
one  of  the  sweetest  of  loving  and  bashful  replies:  "Oh! 
Edward!  this  is  so  un-un-un-unexpected ! '"  What  sylph, 
foreseeing  the  possibility  of  such  a  catastrophe,  would 
superintend  the  conveyance  of  this  dust  to  the  nostrils 
of  a  belle!  What  gnome  would  not  take  a  fiendish  de 
light  in  hovering  over  a  snuff-loving  beauty! 

The  question  who  invented  snuff-taking  is  an  interest 
ing  one  on  which  antiquaries  differ.  That  Catherine  de 
Medicis,  who  instigated  the  horrid  massacre  of  St.  Bar 
tholomew,  is  entitled  to  the  honor  of  so  philanthropic  an 
act,  we  shall  not  believe.  If  she  did  originate  the  practice, 
it  was  from  any  but  philanthropic  motives.  It  is  well 
known  that  when  she  wished  to  get  rid  of  offensive  per 
sons  in  an  "  artistic "  manner,  she  was  in  the  habit  of 
presenting  them  with  delicately  made  sweetmeats,  or 
trinkets,  in  which  death  lurked  in  the  most  engaging 
forms; -and  perhaps  she  had  the  same  end  in  view,  in 
inventing  and  offering  snuff.  Whoever  invented  it,  it 
was  at  the  court  of  the  grand  monarch,  Louis  XIV,  that 
snuff,  with  all  its  expensive  corollaries  of  scents  and  cu 
rious  boxes,  first  received  the  highest  sanction,  so  that 
Moliere  speaks  of  it  as  le  passion  des  honnetes  gens.  In 


A    PItfCH    OF   SNUFF.  369 

England,  it  became  common  after  the  great  plague,  from 
a  belief  that  tobacco,  in  all  its  forms,  prevented  infection. 
Its  use  is  also  said  to  have  increased  very  much  after 
Sir  George  Eooke's  expedition  to  Spain,  great  quantities 
having  been  taken  and  sold  as  prizes.  Howell,  in  a  letter 
on  Tobacco  (1646),  says  that  the  Spanish  and  Irish  "  take 
it  most  in  powder  or  smutchin,  and  it  mightily  refreshes 
the  brain";  and  he  adds  that  the  serving-maids  and  the 
swains  at  the  plow,  when  overtired  with  labor,  "  take  out 
their  boxes  of  smutchin,  and  draw  it  into  their  nostrils 
with  a  quill,  and  it  will  beget  new  spirits  in  them,  with 
a  fresh  orjour  to  fall  to  their  work  again." 

When  William  of  Holland  ascended  the  British  throne, 
the  prevalence  of  the  Dutch  taste  confirmed  the  general 
use  of  snuff,  and  it  was  the  fashion  to  be  curious  in  its 
use.  Valuable  boxes  of  all  stylcj  were  sported,  and  the 
beaux  carried  canes  with  hollow  heads,  that  they  might 
the  more  conveniently  inhale  a  few  grains  through  the 
perforations,  as  they  sauntered  in  the  fashionable  prom 
enades.  Rich  essences  were  employed  to  flavor  snuff,  and 
a  taste  in  such  scents  was  considered  a  necessary  part  of  a 
refined  education.  Now,  snuff-taking  has  become  a  prac 
tice  as  wide-spread  among  civilized  people  as  chewing  or 
smoking, —  is  the  favorite  mode  of  consuming  the  weed 
with  men  of  culture,  quick  intellects,  and  elegant  tastes; 
and  in  every  country,  the  boxes, —  which  are  the  favorite 
presents  of  kings  to  their  favorites, —  are  devised  hardly 
less  ingeniously,  and  ornamented  far  more  expensively, 
than  pipes.  At  the  coronation  of  George  IV,  the  bill  of 
Messrs.  Rundell  and  Bridge  for  snuff-boxes  to  foreign 
ministers,  was  £8,205  15s.  5d.  It  is  estimated  that  in 
France  not  less  than  six  millions  of  persons  take  snuff, 


370  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

consuming  each  two  and  a  half  pounds  annually,  at  an 
expense  of  over  ten  francs  per  nose !  The  bare  duty  paid 
upon  tobacco  and  snuff  in  England  and  Scotland  aver 
aged  in  1850  more  than  twenty-eight  millions  of  dollars 
annually!  —  a  prodigious  amount  to  be  blown  away  in 
smoke,  or  sneezed  away  in  dust,  at  a  time  when  the  gov 
ernment  was  higgling  on  a  paltry  sum  of  £100,000  for 
national  education.  It  is  an  interesting  fact  that  snuff 
ing  is  more  a  Scotch  habit  than  an  English  or  Irish  one. 
We  are  told  that  an  Edinburgh  tobacconist,  who  made  a 
large  fortune  by  the  sale  of  snuff,  had  painted  on  his 
carriage  panels  the  following  pithy  distich: 

"  Wha  wad  a  thocht  it 
That  noses  could  ha'  bought  it?" 

The  consumption  of  the  dust  north  of  the  Tweed  is 
enormous.  Every  man  who  would  have  a  smooth  path 
way  in  "Auld  Scotia"  carries  a  "mull1';  it  is  a  letter  of 
introduction,  a  begetter  of  conversation,  a  maker  of 
friends.  Hence  it  has  been  said  that  the  way  to  a 
Scotchman's  heart  is  "through  his  nose." 

Snuff-taking  necessitates  snuff-boxes,  and  it  is  interest 
ing  to  note  the  ingenuity  which  has  been  expended  in 
different  countries  in  contriving  and  ornamenting  these 
receptacles  of  "the  dust."  In  France,  in  the  age  of 
Louis  XIV,  a  snuff-box  of  some  elegant  material,  whether 
decorated  with  paintings  or  resplendent  with  precious 
stones,  was  part  of  the  necessities  of  a  beauty  of  ton. 
Mr.  Fairholt,  in  his  late  work  on  "  Tobacco,"  states  that 
quaint  forms  have  been  as  common  to  snuff-boxes  as  to 
tobacco-pipes.  Coffins  were  at  one  time  hideously  adapted 
to  hold  the  fragrant  dust.  A  coiled  snake,  whose  central 
folds  form  the  lid,  was  a  box  for  a  naturalist;  a  book 


A    PINCH    OF   SNUFF.  371 

might  serve  for  a  student,  and  a  boat  for  a  sailor.  Of  a 
fashion  in  Queen  Anne's  time  a  poet  thus  sings: 

"Within  the  lid  the  painter  plays  his  part, 
And  with  his  pencil  proves  his  matchless  art; 
There,  drawn  to  life,  some  spark  or  mistress  dwells, 
Like  hermits  chaste  and  constant  to  their  cells." 

When  on  the  death  of  Louis  XV,  the  beautiful  Marie 
Antoinette  ascended  the  throne  of  France,  the  people 
were  so  fascinated  by  her  charms  and  virtues,  that  a 
jeweler  made  a  large  fortune  by  selling  mourning  snuff 
boxes  in  her  honor.  They  were  composed  of  chagrin,  with 
the  motto  La  Consolation  dans  le  Chagrin. 

It  has  been  said  that  snuff-boxes  enough  have  been 
made  of  Shakspeare's  mulberry  tree  to  build  a  man-of-war. 
Perhaps  the  most  unique  and  useful  of  all  these  devices 
was  a  snuff-pistol  with  two  barrels,  invented  about  forty 
years  ago  by  an  Englishman.  By  touching  a  spring  with 
the  forefinger,  both  nostrils  were  instantly  filled,  and  snuff 
enough  was  driven  up  the  nose  to  last  the  whole  day. 
Apropos  to  royal  presents  of  snuff-boxes,  to  which  we  have 
alluded,  a  curious  secret  came  to  light  some  years  ago  in 
England,  showing  the  manner  in  which  kings  are  fleeced 
by  those  with  whom  they  deal,  and  the  heartlessness  of 
those  on  whom  they  lavish  their  favors.  It  appears  that 
the  royal  goldsmith  who  charged  his  majesty  £1,000  or 
£500  for  a  presentation  snuff-box,  was  in  the  habit  of 
purchasing  it  the  next  day  of  the  donee  for  about  half  or 
two  thirds  of  the  nominal  value,  and  that  the  same  box 
was  again  supplied  and  again  repurchased,  till  some  for 
eigner,  not  liking  the  practice  or  the  price,  put  it  in 
his  pocket! 

The  literature  of  snuff-taking  teems  with  amusing  an 
ecdotes,  with  a  few  of  which  we  will  conclude.  Every- 


372  A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

body  has  heard  of  the  thief,  who,  being  arrested  for 
having  "  conveyed "  without  leave  a  canister  of  the  dust 
from  a  shop,  protested  that  he  never  knew  before  that  it 
was  criminal  to  take  snuff;  and  of  the  anti-snuffing  per 
son,  who,  when  politely  tendered  a  pinch,  refused  with 
the  rude  declaration,  that,  had  Nature  intended  his  nose 
for  a  snuff-box,  she  would  have  turned  it  the  other  way, 
—  a  logical  non  sequitur,  by  the  way,  since  by  such  an 
arrangement  the  organ  could  be  less  easily  supplied  than 
now.  Napoleon's  love  of  snuff  has  already  been  hinted 
at;  not  only  on  the  battlefield,  but  at  home  in  the  coun 
cil,  he  had  recourse  to  the  dust,  especially  when  his 
schemes  were  unfavorably  received,  and  he  wished  to  hide 
his  uneasiness  or  impatience.  Unable  to  sit  still  in  his 
elbow-chair,  he  would  try  in  a  thousand  ways  to  divert 
attention  from  himself;  and,  among  other  devices,  as 
soon  as  he  saw  a  member's  eye  fixed  on  him,  would  hold 
out  his  arm,  and  shake  his  thumb  and  forefinger,  to  sig 
nify  that  he  wished  for  a  pinch  of  snuff.  A  box  being 
promptly  tendered,  Napoleon  would  help  himself  to  its 
contents,  and  then  turning  it  round  and  round  in  his 
hands,  would  invariably  conclude,  in  his  abstracted  mood, 
by  putting  it  into  his  pocket.  Not  less  than  four,  and 
even  six,  snuff-boxes,  disappeared  in  this  manner  during 
a  single  sitting;  and  it  was  not  till  he  had  left  the  coun 
cil-chamber  that  he  became  aware  of  the  larceny.  So 
confirmed  was  this  habit,  that  some  of  the  councillors, 
whose  snuff-boxes  were  heir-looms  or  presents  from  for 
eign  princes,  hit  upon  the  expedient  of  carrying  cheap 
papier-mache  or  wooden  boxes  for  the  Emperor  to  pocket. 
The  snuff-boxes,  however,  always  returned  to  their  own 
ers,  and,  in  doing  so,  were  often  found  to  have  undergone 


A   PINCH   OF   SNUFF.  373 

a  very  pleasant  metamorphosis.  By  some  necromancy,  a 
wooden  or  tortoise-shell  box,  on  coming  out  from  the  im 
perial  pocket,  was  usually  transformed  into  one  of  gold, 
set  around  with  diamonds,  or  bearing  the  Emperor's  min 
iature  on  the  lid. 

The  distress  experienced  by  inveterate  snuff-takers 
when  long  deprived  of  their  favorite  stimulus,  drives 
them  sometimes  to  desperate  shifts;  and  in  such  an  ex 
tremity  almost  any  "  Jack-at-a-pinch "  at  all  resembling 
it;  is  eagerly  snapped  up  to  supply  the  place  of  the  real 
article.  A  severe  snow-storm  in  the  Scottish  Highlands, 
which  raged  several  weeks,  so  blockaded  all  communica 
tion  between  neighboring  hamlets,  that  snuff-takers  were 
at  length  reduced  to  their  last  pinch.  Among  the  suf 
ferers  was  the  parson  of  the  parish,  whose  craving  was 
so  intense  that  the  sermon  was  at  a  stand-still.  "  What's 
to  be  done,  John?"  was  his  pathetic  inquiry  of  the 
beadle,  who  had  ended  a  bootless  journey  through  the 
snow-drifts  to  a  neighboring  glen  in  quest  of  a  supply. 
John  shook  his  head  gloomily;  but  soon  started  up  ab 
ruptly,  as  if  a  new  idea  had  struck  him.  In  a  few  min 
utes  he  came  back,  crying,  "Hae!"  The  minister,  too 
eager  to  be  scrutinizing,  took  a  long,  deep  pinch,  and 
then  asked,  "Whaur  did  you  get  it?"  "I  soupit  (swept) 
the  pulpit,"  was  John's  triumphant  reply.  The  parson's 
wasted  snuff  had  come  to  be  eminently  serviceable  in  this 
hour  of  "  fearfullest  extremity." 

The  last  anecdote  might  find  an  appropriate  place  in 
Dean  Ramsay's  amusing  book, —  our  next  in  some  future 
"  Reminiscences  of  New  England  Character."  Some  years 
ago,  a  clergyman  in  the  land  of  steady  habits,  who  was  a 
most  inveterate  snuff-taker,  commenced  the  Sunday  ser- 


374  A    PINCH   OF   SNUFF. 

vice  by  reading  the  fourth  section  of  the  119th  Psalm. 
Unconsciously,  as  he  announced  the  passage  to  be  read, 
and  while  the  hearers  were  looking  it  out  in  their  Bibles, 
he  drew  out  his  snuff-box,  and  took  a  lusty  pinch  of  the 
contents,  which  resulted  in  a  startling  explosion  of  his 
nasal  organ,  making  the  style  of  elocution  somewhat  as 
follows:  "  M y  soul  dea-e-e-e-che-che-e-e-che-che-cleaveth  unto 
the  dust!"  The  titter  that  ran  through  the  church  showed 
that  not  only  the  pcor  parson  but  the  congregation  "  felt 
the  pinch,"  and  were  "  up  to  snuff." 


INDEX. 


Abbott,  his  Life  of  Napoleon,  174. 

Abernethy,  Dr.,  on  mental  sat 
uration,  140. 

Accidents,  the  cause  of  great 
movements,  188,  189. 

Adams,  John  Q.,  anecdote  of,  234. 

Agassiz,  Professor,  unmethodical, 
212;  his  attention  to  details, 
277. 

Allen,  €9!.  John,  281. 

Alliteration,  246-249;  remarkable 
specimen  of,  251. 

Ames,  Fisher,  107,  108. 

Anagrams,  242-246. 

Anglo-Saxons,  Americans  are  not, 
299-306;  glorification  of,  299- 
305;  proportion  of  in  the  U.  S., 
299;  how  distinguished  from 
Americans,  302;  a  heteroge 
neous  race,  303. 

Anne,  Queen  of  England,  curious 
portrait  of,  253. 

Archimedes,  saying  of,  222. 

Authors,  Dr.  R.  South  on,  74. 


Bacon,  Lord,  a  taker  of  bribes, 
193;  on  truth  and  falsehood, 
217;  not  the  father  of  the  In 
ductive  Philosophy,  218. 

Balli9l  College,  Oxford,  318. 

Baptists,  starved  for  heresy,  309. 

Beattie,  Dr.,  his  sensitiveness  to 
harsh  noises,  35. 

Beau  Brummell,  his  snuff-boxes, 
351. 

Becket,  Thomas  a,  his  reply  to  a 
monk,  168. 

Beecher,  H.  W.,  on  Robert  South, 
79,  80. 

Bentham,  Jeremy,  137. 


Berkeley,  Bishop,  his  style,  51; 

his  opinion  about  matter,  218. 
Bibliomania,  336-346;   examples 

of,  345,  346. 
Biography,  its  misrepresentations, 

192-194. 
Blot,   Professor,  his  lectures  on 

cookery,  159. 
"Bluecoat  Bovs,"  their  origin, 

327,  328. 
Bodleian    Library,   Oxford,    324, 

Books  and  Reading,  Professor 
ships  of,  136-158. 

Books,  as  a  means  of  culture,  136- 
139;  original  thinkers  indebted 
to,  137;  they  stimulate  and  in 
flame  the  mind,  138;  may  be 
abused,  139;  necessary  to  men 
tal  vigor,  141 ;  often  cnosen  and 
read  ignorantly,  141-143;  their 
multiplicity,  143-145;  new  ones 
published  annually  in  England 
and  Germany,  144;  the  num 
ber  one  can  read  in  a  lifetime, 
144;  difficulty  of  selecting  them 
wisely,  146;  number  which  a 
college  student  can  read  in  his 
course,  148;  should  be  re-read, 
150;  should  be  adapted  to  in 
dividual  tastes,  151, 152;  should 
be  chosen  for  the  young,  153; 
cannot  teach  the  use  of  books, 
154;  how  read  most  rapidly, 
156-159;  great  prices  paid  for, 
343,  344. 

Book- Auctions,  336-339. 

Book-Buying,  336-346. 

Boyer,  Dr.,  Master  of  Christ's 
Hospital,  331-334. 

Bright,  John,  secret  of  his  power, 
284. 

Brutus,  illusions  concerning,  191. 


376 


INDEX. 


"Buncombe"  speeches  not  tol 
erated  in  the  British  Parlia 
ment,  282,  283. 

Burke,  Edmund,  his  voice,  92; 
his  pronunciation  of ' '  vectigal, ' ' 
124;  a  rapid  reader,  156. 

Burton,  Jonn  Hill,  on  biblio 
mania,  337;  his  account  of  a 
bibliotaphe,  342,  343. 

Butler,  Bishop,  a  great  reader, 
140. 

Butler,  Samuel,  verses  erroneous 
ly  ascribed  to  him,  220. 

Byron,  Lord,  quotation  from  his 
"  Manfred,"  81;  on  underdone 
food,  163;  his  affectation,  194; 
his  influence  waning,  287. 


Caesar,  Julius,  not  a  strong  man, 
130;  his  epicureanism,  166. 

Calvin,  John,  his  scurrility,  64. 

Cambaceres,  167. 

Camden,  on  anagrams,  242. 

Cassius,  Dion,  his  histories,  191. 

Carlyle,  on  the  taste  for  letters, 
155;  a  rapid  reader,  157. 

Chamfort,  Sebastian  Roch  Nich 
olas,  288-298;  his  early  history, 
289;  wins  prizes,  289;  receives 
a  pension,  290;  his  acrid  say 
ings,  290,  295,  296;  his  ex 
cesses,  291 ;  his  witticisms  and 
aphorisms,  291-295;  his  influ 
ence  with  Mirabeau,  291,  292; 
defends  the  French  Revolution, 
292;  denounced,  292;  attempts 
suicide,  292;  his  death,  293; 
his  physiognomy,  293;  his  lit 
erary  remains,  293;  his  disposi 
tion,  296;  his  dislike  of  mar 
riage.  297;  his  forte,  297;  esti 
mate  of,  298. 

Channing,  Dr.  W.  E.,  132. 

Charles  I,  curious  portrait  of, 
253. 

Charles  V,  Emperor,  fictitious 
stories  concerning  him,  211. 

Chatham,  Lord,  his  voice,  91 ;  his 
reply  to  Walpole,  216. 

Christ  Church  College,  Oxford, 
311-315. 


Christina,  of  Sweden,  saying  of, 
207. 

Christ's  Hospital,  an  Hour  at, 
327-335;  its  "Bluecoat  Boys," 
327-329;  when  founded,  328; 
its  eminent  pupils,  331,  332;  its 
master,  1  ->yer,  331-334. 

Cicero,  misquoted,  206. 

Clarence,  the  Duke  of,  not 
drowned  in  Malmsey,  200. 

Clay,  Henry,  his  voice,  92;  a 
snuff- taker,  353. 

Cobbett,  William,  on  writers,  74; 
inspired  by  Swift's  "Tale  of  a 
Tub,  "137. 

Coincidences  of  thought  and  ex 
pression,  207-210,  214. 

Coleridge,  S.  T.,  his  discursive 
ness,  53;  aided  by  DeQuincey, 
54;  his  father's  absent-minded 
ness,  38,39;  a  rapid  reader,  156; 
his  idleness  and  irregularity, 
276,  277;  at  Christ's  Hospital, 
332-334. 

Columbus,  Christopher,  191. 

Constitution,  the  physical,  its 
power  of  self- repair,  135. 

Controversy,  ancient  and  modern 
compared,  63-65. 

Cookery,  importance  of,  159,  161, 
163. 

Cornaro,  Lewis,  134. 

Corpus  Christi  College,  Oxford, 
316. 

Cranmer,  Archbishop,  burned  at 
Oxford,  311. 

Cromwell,  Oliver,  181. 


D'Artois,  Count,  saying  invented 
for,  214-216. 

Davy,  Rev.  Wm.,  his  "  System  of 
Divinity,"  238,  239. 

Debating-clubs,  284-286. 

Defoe,  Daniel,  on  "True-Born 
Englishmen,"  302-304. 

DeMaistre,  Joseph,  on  Bacon's 
philosophy,  218,  219. 

De  Maistre,  Xavier,  on  method 
ical  people,  277,278. 

DeMedicis,  Catherine,  her  treat 
ment  of  her  enemies,  368. 


INDEX. 


377 


Demosthenes  on  oratory,  206. 

DeQuincey,  Thomas,  9-57;  his 
personal  appearance,  9,  33,  34; 
his  versatility,  10,  13;  his  re 
markable  dreams,  12 ;  his  literary 
vagrancy,  14,  53,  54;  noticed  in 
the  "  Noctes  "  of  Blackwood, 
14;  his  parentage  and  birth 
place,  15;  his  weakness  in 
childhood,  16,  17;  his  feelings 
on  the  death  of  his  sister,  16, 
17;  his  elder  brother's  tyranny, 
17-20;  his  proficiency  in  Greek 
and  Latin,  20,  21;  his  escape 
from  school  and  wanderings  in 
Wales,  20;  his  trials  in  London, 
21-24;  his  love  of  English  liter 
ature,'^;  his  acquaintance  with 
"poor  Anne,"  23,  24;  his  life 
at  Oxford  University,  24,  25; 
his  gift  to  Coleridge,  25 ;  his  life 
at  Grasmere,  25;  on  Words 
worth's  good  luck,  25,  26;  be 
gins  taking  opium,  26;  his  ac 
count  of  its  effects,  27-30;  his 
picture  of  his  home  at  Grasmere, 
27;  his  opium-dreams,  29,  30; 
his  "  Confessions  of  an  Opium- 
Eater,"  29,  32;  abjures  opium, 
31, 32;  begins  his  literary  labors, 
32;  moves  to  Edinburgh,  32; 
returns  to  Grasmere,  32 ;  invites 
Charles  Knight  to  visit  him,  32, 
33;  dies  at  Lass  wade,  33;  his 

Ehysical  sufferings  at  close  of 
is  life,  33;  his  shyness  and 
eccentricity,  34,  35;  his  love  of 
music,  34,  49;  his  sensitiveness 
to  harsh  noises,  34,  35;  his 
courtesy,  35-37;  his  ignorance 
of  money  matters,  36;  his  dose 
of  laudanum,  37,  38;  his  eccen 
tric  social  habits,  37,  38;  his 
costume  at  a  dinner  party,  38; 
his  dislike  of  shirts,  38;  his 
treatment  of  books,  39,  40;  his 
indifference  to  the  fate  of  his 
writings,  40;  his  learning,  40, 
41;  his  memory,  41;  a  close 
observer  of  character,  42;  his 
power  of  detecting  resem  • 
blances,  42;  his  critical  acute- 


ness,  42;  his  distinction  between 
the  literature  of  knowledge  and 
that  of  power,  43;  his  criticism 
on  Pope,  43;  his  criticisms  on 
Brougham,  Junius,  Sheridan, 
and  Parr,  44;  contrasted  with 
Coleridge,  44;  his  humor,  45-48; 
his  contrast  of  the  stage-coach 
with  the  railway,  45,  46;  his 
"Murder  considered  as  one  of 
the  Fine  Arts,"  46,  47;  his 
pathos,  48,  49;  his  recital  of  a 
victory  in  Spain,  48,  49;  his 
genius  for  the  sublime,  49-  his 
dialectic  skill,  49;  his  "Logic 
of  Political  Economy,"  49;  his 
style,  50,  51;  his  remark  on 
Berkeley's  style,  51 ;  his  irreso 
lution  ;  his  writings  fragmentary 
and  indeterminate,  52,  53;  his 
apology  for  his  vagrancy,  53; 
his  conversation,  53,  56;  his 
writings  commended  to  young 
men,  56,  57;  deplores  the  pre 
ference  of  foreign  literatures  to 
the  English,  268;  explains  the 
reason  of  this  preference,  269; 
censures  the  clerical  misrepre 
sentations  of  English  history, 
176;  his  opinion  of  Hume  as  a 
historian,  178;  his  estimate  of 
the  number  of  volumes  that  can 
be  read  in  a  lifetime,  144. 

Dexter,  Timothy,  anecdote  of,  107, 
108. 

Dibdin,  T.  F.,  D.D.,  his  account 
of  the  "  Roxburgh  Fight,"  343, 
344. 

Dinner,  its  connection  with  liber 
ality,  160, 161;  with  kind  feel 
ing,  161 ;  its  intellectual  aspects. 
163;  an  index  of  national  life, 
169. 

Disraeli,  Benjamin,  on  the  values 
of  history  and  poetry,  185. 

Dreams,  De  Quincey's,  29-31. 

Dry  den,  John,  when  most  in 
spired,  31. 

Dumas,  Alexandre,  his  ironical 
compliment  to  Lamartine,  204. 

Dying  words  of  great  men,  216, 
'217. 


378 


IXDEX. 


Early  Rising,  homilies  upon,  229- 
236;  arguments  for,  229,  230; 
objections  to,  230-236;  origin 
of  the  practice,  236;  Robert 
Hall  on,  274. 

Education,  Dr.  R.  South  on,  75; 
the  proper  otyect  of,  120-127; 
why  needed  in  practical  pur 
suits,  126;  not  all  acquired  in 
school,  149. 

Elam,  Dr.  Charles,  on  the  healths 
of  senior  wranglers  and  boat 
men,  131;  on  the  age  of  cele 
brated  thinkers,  134. 

England,  histories  of,  176;  Hume's, 
176-179;  when  named,  200. 

English  literature,  its  superiority 
to  the  Greek,  22. 

Englishmen  as  orators,  283,  284. 

Epitaph,  curious,  254. 

Error,  its  tenacity  of  life,  217. 

Esquiros,  M.,  on  English  diet.  164. 

Everett,  Edward,  his  toast  to 
Judge  Story,  114. 


Fame,  literary,  287,  288. 

Faraday,  Professor,  137. 

Farragut,  Admiral,  at  Mobile, 
196 

Fenelon,  his  love  of  reading,  138. 

Fluency,  easy  to  acquire,  280;  not 
characteristic  of  full  men,  280, 
286 ;  a  disadvantage  in  the 
House  of  Commons,  282,  283. 

Fontenelle,  mythical  story  of,  221. 

Fontenoy,  the  battle  of,  196. 

Foote,  the  comedian,  witticism  of, 
208. 

Francis  I,  of  France,  his  letter 
from  Pavia,  205. 

Franklin,  Dr.  Benjamin,  his  in 
debtedness  to  Cotton  Mather, 
137;  not  fluent,  281;  on  a  veg 
etable  diet,  168. 

Frederic  the  Great,  his  knowl 
edge  of  French,  265;  an  early 
riser,  229,  233. 

Frenchmen,  their  love  of  epi 
grams,  213. 


Froude,  J.  A.,  on  writing  history, 
186;  on  the  disagreements  of 
English  historians,  186;  his  his 
tory  of  England,  187. 


Galen,  his  feebleness,  134. 

Galileo,  his  "epur  si  muove,"  210, 
211;  not  a  martyr,  211. 

Gallatin,  Albert,  Judge  Story's 
opinion  of  him,  108. 

Germans,  the,  their  dislike  of  long 
speeches,  282. 

Gibbon,  Edward,  his  love  of  read 
ing,  137;  his  history,  179,  180; 
anecdote  of,  221 ;  an  early  riser, 
230;  his  snuff- taking,  353. 

Goethe,  his  mode  of  studying 
languages,  267. 

Good  living,  its  pleasures  relished 
by  famous  men,  166;  required 
by  the  scholar,  167. 

Goodness,  dependent  on  the  stom 
ach,  159-163. 

Graham,  Dr.  Sylvester,  his  bran- 
bread  system,  117,  167;  effects 
of  his  regimen,  117;  his  loss  of 
popularity,  118. 

Graham,  John ,  of  Claverhouse,  1 73 . 

Great  men,  often  feeble  in  body, 
134;  their  "memorable  say 
ings  "  generally  fabrications, 
201-223;  coincidences  in  their 
sayings,  207-210. 

Greenleaf,  Prof.  Simon,  as  a  legal 
teacher,  99. 

Gregory,  Nazianzen,  his  anathe 
mas  of  Julian,  63. 

Guizot,  on  moral  chronology  in 
history,  180,  181. 

Guy,  Thomas,  192. 

H 

Hackett,  Dr.  H.  B.,  an  earnest 
reader,  158. 

Hall,  Robert,  on  the  conversation 
of  Mackintosh,  102;  on  Dr. 
Kippis's  reading,  139;  on  early 
rising,  274;  on  the  beauty  of 
Oxford,  308;  his  love  of  the 
pipe,  364. 


INDEX. 


379 


Hamerton,  P.  G.,  on  learning  a 
modern  language,  265-267. 

Hamilton,  Sir  W.,  on  desultory 
reading,  150. 

Handel,  his  voracity,  166. 

Hazlitt,  William,  saying  of,  160. 

Heber,  Richard,  his  libraries,  345. 

Henry  IV  of  France,  imaginary 
mot  of,  205.  206. 

Henry  VIII,  166. 

Henry  of  Guise,  King  of  Naples, 

J-Ot/. 

Henry,  Patrick,  his  mode  of  read 
ing  books,  156. 

Hill,  Rowland,  his  denunciation 
of  Charles  Wesley,  65;  his  ear 
nestness,  95. 

Hippocrates,  on  mental  differ 
ences,  159. 

Historians,  their  difficulties,  ITS- 
ITS;  Montaigne  on,  180;  forget 
moral  chronology,  180;  their 
love  of  antithesis,  183;  their 
treatment  of 'the  old  chroniclers, 
185. 

Historical  criticism,  171. 

History,  Rev.  F.  W.  Robertson  on, 
174;  F.  W.  Froude  on,  174, 175; 
its  facts  ductile,  ib.;  origin  of 
its  lies,  183-188;  less  truthful 
than  fiction,  185;  dangers  of 
conjecture  in,  186;  its  truth 
sacrificed  to  effect,  187;  its 
great  events  caused  by  accidents 
or  petty  means,  188;  its  reha 
bilitations  of  villains,  189,  190; 
its  disenchantments,  190-194, 
223-228;  defined  by  Voltaire, 
195;  some  of  its  doubtful  stories, 
197,  198;  its  substance  not 
forged,  224. 

Hobbes  of  Malmesbury,  saying 
of,  140. 

Hobbies,  341. 

Homilies  on  Early  Rising,  229- 

Huet,  Bishop  of  Avranches,  say 
ing  of,  145. 

Hume,  David,  his  history,  176- 
179;  his  death,  216,  217. 

Hunt,  Leigh,  on  the  modes  of 
snuff-taking,  356. 


I 

Iconoclasm,  224. 

Idiosyncrasies  of  celebrated  men, 

366. 
Illusions  of  History,  171-228;  their 

supposed  utility,  223,  224;  their 

loss  not  to  be  regretted,  224-227. 
Imperial  Guard,  the  French,  at 

Waterloo,  204. 
Indigestion,  its  moral  effects,  160, 

162;  its  political  effects,  16;  the 

cause  of  military  defeats,  164. 
Inquisition,  the,  173. 
Irishmen,   their  contributions  to 

American  prosperity,  300,  301. 


Jackson,  Gen.  Andrew,  and  the 

cotton-bags  story,  202. 
Jefferson,   President,  not  fluent, 

281. 
Johnson,  Dr.  Samuel,  his  capacity 

for  work,  131,  132;  on  reading, 

148;    a  rapid  reader,  156;   on 

sickness,  160;  a  snuff-taker,  352. 
Journalism,  its  effects  on  writers, 

298. 

Jovius,  Paulus,  on  history,  175. 
Judgment,     the    most    valuable 

mental  faculty,  124,  125. 
' '  Juggernaut, ' '  errors  concerning, 

201. 

K 

Kane,  Dr.  Elisha,  133. 

Karr,  Alphonse,  on  tobacco,  348. 

Kean,  Edmund,  his  adaptation  of 

food  to  his  theatrical  parts,  163. 
Knowledge,  its  branches  related, 

151. 

L 

Labor,  the  limit  of  mental,  131; 
misdirected,  237-240. 

Lamb,  Charles,  on  tobacco,  347; 
his  love  of  snuff,  354;  at  Christ's 
Hospital,  333. 

Languages,  foreign,  study  of,  263 
-271;  Goethe's  study  of,  266, 
267 ;  why  their  study  is  fashion 
able,  268,  269. 

Leigh,  Dr.  Theophilus,  318. 


380 


INDEX. 


Lewis,  Dio,on  health  and  strength, 

Library,  the  National,  at  Paris, 
143;  of  the  British  Museum, 
143,  144. 

Lipogrammatists,  240. 

Literary  triflers,  237-255. 

Literature,  that  of  knowledge  dis 
tinguished  from  the  literature 
of  power,  43;  its  dependence 
on  cookery,  163,  164. 

Locke,  John,  misrepresented,  218. 

Longevity,  a  test  of  strength,  134. 

Lope  de  Vega,  his  lipograms,  240. 

Louis  XIV,  his  sayings,  207,  213. 

Louis  XVI,  his  parting  from  his 
family,  198. 

Luther,  Martin,  as  a  controver 
sialist,  63. 

Luttrell,  Henry,  witticism  of,  209. 

Luxemburg,  his  endurance,  134. 

M 

Macaulay,  T.  B.,  his  history,  174, 
181-183;  on  Gibbon's  history, 
179 ;  his  injustice  to  Marl- 
borough,  181,  183;  his  "New 
Zealander, ' '  209 ;  on  writing  for 
periodicals,  260;  studies  the 
German  language,  265;  anec 
dote  by,  137. 

Macclesfield,  Lord,  his  advocacy 
of  a  reform  of  the  calendar,  171 . 

Maclaurin,  on  the  relations  of 
knowledges,  151. 

Madison,  Mrs.  James,  her  snuff 
box,  355. 

Magdalen  College,  Oxford,  321- 
323. 

Maiden,  Prof.,  on  education,  120- 
123. 

Man,  not  designed  to  be  a  mere 
mechanic,  merchant,  etc.,  125, 
126;  before  the  Fall,  65,  66. 

Marlborough,  Duke  of,  181,  183. 

Marshall,  Chief  Justice,  anecdote 
of,  108;  his  logical  power,  109; 
Daniel  Webster  on,  110. 

Mason,  Dr.  John,  saying  of,  161. 

Merton  CoUege,  Oxford,  316-318. 

Method,  martyrs  to,  273,  274;  de 
generates  into  priggishness,277. 


Michelet,  the  French  historian, 
inspired  by  Virgil,  137. 

Milton,  John,  his  learning,  140; 
his  violence  in  controversy,  64, 
65;  on  linguistic  knowledge, 
267;  on  scrupulists,  278;  and 
his  daughters,  200;  on  earth 
quakes,  363. 

Mint,  U.  S.,  savings  in,  147. 

Mirabeau,  his  indebtedness  to 
Chamfort,  292;  his  reply  to  the 
minister  of  Louis  XVI,  214. 

Misquotations,  219,  220. 

Mitford,  Wm.,  his  history  of 
Greece,  174. 

Moigno,  the  Abbe,  effects  of  to 
bacco  on  his  memory,  364. 

Montagu,  Lady  Mary  W.,  saying 
of,  225. 

Montaigne,  on  historians,  180;  on 
working  by  rule,  278. 

Montpensier,  saying  of,  208. 

Moore,  Thomas,  his  songs,  287; 
anecdote  of,  353. 

Moral  Grahamism,  117-128. 

Morality  of  Good  Living,  159-170. 

More,  Hannah,  saying  of,  162. 

Moscow,  not  destroyed  by  the 
Russians,  199. 

N 

Napoleon  I,  his  anagram,  246; 
his  power  of  labor  and  delicate 
digestion,  130;  his  Memoirs, 
173;  a  rapid  reader,  156;  his 
ascent  of  the  Alps,  198;  paral 
yzed  by  indigestion,  165;  a 
saying  of,  281;  a  snuff- taker, 
353,  372;  his  habit  of  borrow 
ing  snuff-boxes,  372,  373 ;  his 
death  caused  by  snuff-taking, 
365. 

Nelson,  Lord,  imaginary  sayings 
of,  202,  203;  on  the  Battle  of 
the  Nile,  207. 

New  College,  Oxford,  319-321. 

Newman,  Prof.  J.  H.,  on  mental 
culture,  123. 

Newspapers,  advice  to  their  con 
tributors,  257-262;  what  are 
most  popular,  258;  "maps  of 
busy  life,  "259. 


ISTDEX. 


381 


New  Testament,  interpolations  of. 
226,  227. 

Newton,  Sir  Isaac,  139;  saying  of, 
145;  mythical  stories  of,  199. 

Normans,  the  defenders  of  lib 
erty,  304,  305. 


Opium,  DeQuincey's  experiences 
with  it,  26-32;  its  exaltation  of 
the  ideas,  27;  the  torments  it 
inflicts,  27-30. 

Order  of  the  Garter,  its  supposed 
origin,  198. 

Oriel  College,  Oxford,  317. 

Oxford,  a  Day  at,  307-326; 
beauty  of,  307,  308,  315. 


Palmerston,  Lord,  his  power  of 
work,  132;  contrasted  with  Mr. 
Horsman,  283. 

Parr,  Dr.  Samuel,  166. 

Parsons,  Chief-Justice,  a  rapid 
reader,  157. 

Pascal,  Blaise,  138. 

Pembroke  College,  Oxford,  316. 

Penmanship,  microscopic,  252. 

Philip  of  Valois,  imaginary  say 
ings  of,  204,  205. 

Piety,  dependent  on  the  physical 
health,  161,  162. 

Pinckney,  Gen.  Charles  C.,  his 
reply  to  Bonaparte,  212. 

Pope,  Alexander,  curious  portrait 
of,  253;  his  capacity  for  labor, 
131;  an  epicure,  166. 

"Practical"  education,  the  pop 
ular  idea  of  it,  119,  120;  objec 
tions  to,  120-126;  true  defined, 
126-128;  not  incompatible  with 
high  culture,  125;  its  advan 
tages,  127,  128. 

Professorships  of  Books  and  Read 
ing,  136-158;  R.  W.  Emerson 
upon,  146;  objection  to,  154; 
qualifications  for,  154,  155;  du 
ties  of,  154,  157. 

Prynne,  William,  238. 

Q 

Quincy,  Josiah,  anecdote  of,  234. 


Races,  the  most  powerful,  306. 

Raleigh,  Sir  W.,  172. 

Readers,  339,  340;  wholesale,  340. 

Reading,  the  abuse  of,  139,  140; 
cannot  injure  an  active  mind, 
140;  mistakes  about,  141,  142, 
158;  profitless,  142,  143;  should 
be  systematic  and  thorough, 

149,  150;  effects  of  desultory, 
150;    should    be    multifarious, 

150,  151 ;  and  have  reference  to 
individual  tastes,  151-153;  yet, 
needs  an  adviser,  153;  manuals 
and  "  courses  "  of,  154;  how  to 
economize  it,  156-159;  method 
of  Patrick  Henry,  Dr.  Johnson, 
Burke,    Napoleon,    Coleridge, 
Judge  Parsons,    Thierry,    and 
Carlyle,   156,   157 ;  intensity  of 
Dr.  Hackett  in,  158. 

Read,  T.  Buchanan,  his  verses  on 
Admiral  Farragut,  197. 

Renan,  on  deceptions,  227,  228. 

Rhymes,  double,  252. 

Richardson,  Samuel,  his  novels, 
288. 

Richter,  Jean  Paul,  on  reading 
and  speaking,  286. 

Riddles,  253-255. 

Robespierre,  184. 

Rome,  its  early  history,  190. 

Rousseau,  J.  J.,  on  "the  profes 
sion  of  humanity,1'  126;  his 
anagram,  245. 

Roxburgh,  the  Duke  of,  sale  of 
his  library,  343-344. 


Sainte  Pierre,  story  of,  198. 

Saint  George,  an  impostor,  192. 

Scholarship,  not  incompatible  with 
practical  ability,  125 ;  favorable 
to  success  in  all  callings,  125; 
encyclopaedic,  145. 

Scott,  Sir  Walter,  anecdote  of. 
209;  on  methodical  people,  273. 

Shakspeare,  on  feeding  and  fast 
ing,  161. 

Sheridan,  Richard  B.,  193,  210. 

Skepticism,  its  compensations, 
224,  225. 


382 


INDEX. 


Smith,  Sydney,  on  indigestible 
food,  160;  description  of  a 
French  savant,  354. 

Smokers,  their  excesses,  363. 

Sneezing,  its  pleasures,  357,  358; 
scientifically  explained,  358;  pic 
turesque  description  of,  359; 
why  it  calls  forth  the  exclama 
tion  of  "God  bless  you,"  361; 
a  good  or  bad  omen  with  the 
ancients,  361,  362;  superstitions 
about  it,  361,  362;  a  terrific 
instance  of,  363. 

Snuff,  a  pinch  of,  347-374;  its 
consumers  a  serious  class,  350; 
its  influence  on  Presidential 
elections,  355;  modes  of  taking 
it,  356;  its  adulterations,  366, 
367;  duty  on,  in  Great  Britain, 
370. 

Snuff-boxes,  their  varieties,  369- 
372;  royal,  371,  372. 

Snuff- taking,  the  best  mode  of 
using  tobacco,  349-350,  363; 
celebrated  persons  addicted  to, 
350-354;  promotes  social  enjoy 
ment,  354;  the  modes  of,  356; 
legal  prohibitions  of,  360,  361; 
time  wasted  in,  361;  Bos  well 
on  its  pleasures,  361;  preferable 
to  smoking,  363,  364;  effects  of 
excess  in,  364-366;  not  neces 
sarily  injurious,  376;  chief  ob 
jections  to,  366;  effects  on  the 
complexion,  367;  in  the  days  of 
Queen  Anne  and  of  Louis  XV, 
367;  fatal  to  romance,  368;  by 
whom  invented,  368;  in  France 
and  England,  368-370;  in  Scot 
land,  370;  anecdotes  of,  372- 
374. 

Solitude,  De  Quincey  on,  17. 

Southey,  Robert,  on  Words 
worth's  treatment  of  books,  40; 
an  excessive  reader,  139;  his 
methodical  habits,  275;  value 
of  his  works,  275,  276;  little 
read,  287. 

South,  Robert,  D.D.,  58-80;  com 
pared  with  Sydney  Smith,  58; 
his  birth  and  education,  58,  59 ; 
his  studies  at  Oxford,  59  j  elect 


ed  public  orator  to  the  Univer 
sity,  59;  his  sermon  on  "The 
Scribe  Instructed,"  59-61;  on 
qualifications  of  the  preacher, 
59,  60;  on  the  rhetoric  of  the 
Scriptures,  61 ;  becomes  a  parti 
san  of  the  Restoration,  62;  his 
sermon  on  "  Pretense  of  Con 
science  no  Excuse  for  Rebell 
ion,"  62,  63;  on  the  execution 
of  Charles  I,  62;  his  denuncia 
tion  of  Vane  and  Milton,  62; 
his  sermon  on  "Man  Created 
in  God's  Image,"  65,  66;  his 
sermon  on  "The  Pleasantness 
of  Wisdom's  Ways,"  66,  67; 
on  the  Roman  austerities,  67; 
made  Prebendary  of  St.  Peter's, 
Westminster,  67;  made  canon 
of  Christ  Church,  Oxford,  67; 
his  discourse  on  "Christ's 
Promise  the  Support  of  his 
Despised  Ministers,"  67;  his 
ridicule  of  Jeremy  Taylor,  67, 
68;  his  sermon  on  "All  Contin 
gencies  Directed  by  God's  Prov 
idence,"  69;  his  hit  at  Crom 
well,  69 ;  refuses  a  bishopric,  69 ; 
his  attitude  toward  William 
III,  69;  his  bodily  infirmities, 
69 ;  his  death,  70;  compared  with 
Hooker,  Barrow  and  Taylor, 
70;  his  principal  characteristics, 
70;  his  plainness  of  speech,  70, 
71;  his  command  of  vehement 
language,  71,  72;  his  intensity 
of  thought  and  feeling,  72 ;  his 
aphorisms  and  epigrams,  72,  73; 
his  sermon  on  "  Extempore 
Prayer,"  72-74;  his  style,  74- 
76;  quotations  from,  74-76,  79; 
his  knowledge  of  hum  an  nature, 
76;  his  coarsenesses  of  lan 
guage,  76,  77;  his  wit,  77-79; 
his  ridicule  of  the  Puritans,  77, 
78. 

Speaking,  public,  excessive  in 
America,  279,  280. 

Spurgeon,  Rev.  Charles  H.,  81- 
96;  his  "Tabernacle"  de 
scribed,  81,  82;  his  physiocr- 
nomy,  82,  90;  his  voice,  83,  91, 


INDEX. 


383 


92;  his  Sunday  service,  83;  one 
of  his  sermons  analyzed,  with 
extracts,  84-86;  his  poor  health, 
86;  account  of  an  interview 
with  him,  87;  his  preparation 
of  sermons,  87;  disclaims  elo 
quence,  87,  88;  his  wit,  88;  the 
secret  of  his  power,  89-96;  his 
audiences,  89;  wide  circulation 
of  his  sermons,  89;  his  popu 
larity  as  a  preacher,  89;  his 
culture,  90,  91;  not  a  theolo 
gian,  91,  95;  his  delivery,  92; 
his  language,  92,  93;  his  pic 
torial  style,  93,  94;  his  earnest 
ness,  94,  95;  not  a  sensational 
preacher,  95. 

Sterne,  Lawrence,  193. 

Story,  Joseph,  97-116;  his  per 
sonal  appearance,  and  manner, 
97,  98;  his  wit  and  humor,  98, 
102,  114,  115;  contrasted  with 
Professor  Simon  Greenleaf,  99; 
his  manner  as  a  lecturer,  100; 
his  elasticity  and  vivacity,  101 ; 
his  qualifications  as  a  legal 
teacher,  101 ;  his  prodigality 
of  learning,  102;  his  eloquence 
on  Constitutional  themes,  102, 
103;  his  descriptions  of  great 
bar  contests,  103, 104;  his  anec 
dotes  of  William  Pinkney,  104- 
107;  his  description  of  Thomas 
Addis  Emmet,  105;  his  account 
of  the  arguments  in  the  "Ne- 
reide  "  case,  105-107;  his  anec 
dote  of  Dexter,  Ames,  and 
Marshall,  107,  108;  his  opinion 
of  Albert  Gallatin,  108;  on 
hasty  legislation,  108;  on  young 
statesmen,  109;  compares  the 
elder  and  the  younger  Pitt,  109; 
exposes  Lord  Chatham's  incon 
sistency,  109 ;  his  panegyrics  on 
Chief  Justice  Marshall,  109, 110; 
on  changes  in  the  U.  S.  Consti 
tution,  110;  on  the  difficulty 
of  framing  unambiguous  laws, 
110;  on  the  proper  title  of  John 
Tyler,  111;  on  Daniel  Web 
ster's  magnanimity,  111;  his 
frankness  in  avowing  his  judi 


cial  errors,  111;  his  industry, 
111,  112;  his  literary  and  polit 
ical  publications,  112;  his  econ 
omy  of  time,  112;  his  fame  as 
a  jurist,  112,  113;  his  love  of 
praise,  113;'  his  experience  in 
borrowing  money,  113, 114;  his 
love  for  his  pupils,  114;  his  tact, 
115;  on  Shelley's  case,  115;  his 
panegyric  on  Courts  of  Equity, 
115;  his  favorite  maxims,  115; 
his  early  poems  and  orations, 
116;  his  address  at  Mt.  Auburn 
Cemetery,  116;  his  statue,  116; 
witticisms  of,  234,  235. 

Strength  and  Health,  129-135. 

Strength,  tests  of  physical,  133- 
Io5. 

"Strong,"  meanings  of  the  word, 
130-135. 

Study  of  the  Modern  Languages, 
263-271;  its  advantages,  263, 
its  difficulties  underrated,  265; 
Mr.  Hammerton  on,  265,  266, 
267;  when  advisable,  268,  270; 
why  preferred  to  the  study  of 
English  writers,  269 ;  injures  a 
writer's  style,  269,  270 ;  Schil 
ler's  and  Moore's  opinion  of, 
269;  not  necessary  to  a  knowl 
edge  of  foreign  literatures,  270. 

Suidas,  the  historian,  191. 

Sully,  Duke  of,  witty  saying  of, 
207;  on  the  battle  of  Aumaule, 
172. 

Sumner,  Charles,  his  notices  of 
Judge  Story,  111,  112. 

Swift,  Jonathan,  D.D.,  his  letter 
to  Halifax,  69;  on  the  writing 
of  history,  196;  anecdote  of,  219. 

Sydney,  Algernon,  193. 


Taine,  H.,  on  style,  261. 

Talleyrand,  saying  of,  166;  cred 
ited  with  other  men's  witti 
cisms,  212,  213. 

Taylor,  Gen.  Zachary,  his  order  at 
Buena  Vista,  202. 

Taylor,  Jeremy,  his  style  ridiculed 
by  South,  67,  68. 

Tell,  William,  a  myth,  191,  192. 


384 


INDEX. 


Thackeray,  W.  M.,  witticism  of, 
209. 

Thelwall,  John,  his  supposed  re 
ply  to  Erskine,  212. 

Thierry,  a  rapid  reader,  157. 

Thirlwall,  his  History  of  Greece, 

Thomson,  James,  a  late  riser, 
233. 

Tillier,  M.,  saying  of,  149. 

Time,  economy  of,  147,  149;  how 
to  economize  in  reading,  156- 
158. 

Times,  London,  on  a  working 
constitution,  132. 

Tobacco,  its  fascinations,  347- 
349;  inconsistency  of  its  ene 
mies,  356. 

Toplady,  Augustus  M.,  his  de 
nunciation  of  C.  Wesley,  65. 

Torstenston,  Swedish  general,  132. 

Truth,  its  value,  228. 

V 

Vatel,  the  cook  of  Conde,  169. 

Vengeur,  story  of  the,  196. 

Vespucchi,  Amerigo,  192. 

Villains,  historical  rehabilitations 
of,  189,  190. 

Voltaire,  on  the  Massacre  of  St. 
Bartholomew,  162;  an  inventor 
of  historical  "facts,"  205;  his 
reply  to  Haller,  208;  his  name 
an  anagram,  246. 

W 

Walpole,   Sir   Robert,  supposed 

saying  of,  219. 

Washington,  his  brevity,  280. 
Webster,  Daniel,  on  Chief- Justice 

Marshall's  logic,  110. 


on  snuff-taking, 


Wellington,  Duke  of,  124;  ficti 
tious  stories  concerning  him, 
197,  204;  on  a  great  victory, 
208;  on  early  rising,  229;  on 
speaking  French,  267. 

Welsh  blood,  in  eminent  Amer 
icans,  301,  302. 

Wesley,  Charles,  denounced  by 
Rowland  Hill  and  Toplady, 
65. 

Wesley,  John,  on  earnestness  in 
preaching,  95. 

Wesley,  Samuel, 
357. 

Whately,  Archbishop,  on  Gib 
bon's  History,  179. 

William  III,  of  England,  his 
power  of  endurance,  133,  134. 

Winship,  Dr.  Charles,  134. 

Wirz,  the  jailor  of  Andersonville, 
Quid's  defense  of  him,  196. 

Wit,  a  forgotten,  287-298. 

Wolfe,  Gen.  James,  132. 

Wollaston,  138. 

Wolsey,  Cardinal,  166. 

Woodworth,  194. 

Wordsworth,  his  good  luck,  25, 
26. 

Working  by  Rule,  272-278. 

Writing,  fast,  261. 

Writing  for  the  Press,  256-262; 
an  art,  257;  its  difficulties,  257, 
258. 

X 

Xerxes,  fictitious  stories  of,  197. 


Yankee   Doodle,  its  authorship, 

221,  222. 
Young,  Edward,  193,  194. 


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